Shortwave vs Superhuman

Shortwave is an AI email client built by former Google engineers that wraps Gmail with inbox organization tools and an agent you can prompt to search, write, schedule, and filter mail. It runs on iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows and syncs with Gmail accounts. The app positions itself as a spiritual successor to Google Inbox, with bundles, splits, and keyboard shortcuts at the center of daily triage.

Most Gmail add-ons bolt on one feature. Shortwave treats the whole inbox as a workflow surface: you triage with bundles and todos first, then ask the agent to draft replies, run natural language search across years of mail, or spin up filters written in plain English. That combo of Inbox-style organization plus a prompt-driven assistant sets it apart from Superhuman-style speed clients and basic AI summarizers.

Sales reps, founders, and support leads use it to split high-priority threads, track read receipts, and share live threads with teammates without pasting screenshots into Slack. Teams on Gmail who miss Inbox bundles or want calendar-aware scheduling from inside mail tend to stick with it once they adopt the Shortwave Method triage flow.

Superhuman Mail is an email assistant built for people who live in Gmail or Outlook and want to move faster. Split Inbox separates team, VIP, and tool notifications so urgent threads surface first. AI drafts replies in your voice, schedules follow-up reminders, and shares live email views with teammates who can comment without forwarding chains.

Gmail adds features slowly and Outlook optimizes for enterprises, not speed. Superhuman Mail targets keyboard-first workflows with read statuses, snippet macros, autocorrect tuned for email, and collision detection when two teammates reply at once. The broader Superhuman suite now bundles Grammarly, Docs, and the Go AI agent, but Mail remains the piece that promises to save about four hours per person each week.

Sales teams, founders, and customer success groups on Business plans get Mail alongside CRM sidebar integrations for HubSpot, Salesforce, and Pipedrive. Free and Pro tiers cover writing and docs tools only; Mail unlocks at the Business plan level.