The best Ugly Email alternative
Ugly Email has 50,000+ users and a 4.5-star rating, and for years it was the default way to spot trackers in Gmail. The reasons people now look for an alternative are concrete: it is Gmail-only, it marks trackers with an eye icon but does not block them — so the 1x1 pixel still fires and the open still leaks — and it has been largely unmaintained since 2022. Mailshade is built to close exactly those gaps. It cancels the tracker request at the network layer via Chrome's declarativeNetRequest, so nothing is sent to the sender, and it does this across six web clients: Gmail, Outlook, Office 365, Superhuman, Yahoo Mail and ProtonMail. It also unwraps click-tracking redirect links and keeps a per-sender reporting dashboard in local IndexedDB. Like Ugly Email it is open source — published under AGPL-3.0 — but it is actively maintained and blocks rather than warns.
Why people leave Ugly Email
- Warning, not blocking: the eye icon marks a tracker, but the pixel still loads and the open is logged.
- Gmail only: no help in Outlook, Office 365, Superhuman, Yahoo or ProtonMail.
- Stale: little maintenance since 2022, and no click-tracker handling.
What Mailshade does differently
Mailshade uses declarativeNetRequest to cancel the pixel request before it fires, so the sender gets no open signal at all. It covers six clients, unwraps click-tracking redirects, and records every blocked event in IndexedDB to chart which senders track you most.
What Ugly Email still does well
Ugly Email is open source, simple, and free, with a long track record in Gmail. If you only use Gmail, never click tracked links, and are content with a warning indicator, it remains usable.
Moving over
Mailshade is a separate extension; there is no migration step. Install it, and tracking is blocked across your clients. Source and pricing are at mailshade.org and github.com/mailshade/mailshade.
FAQ
Why is Mailshade a better Ugly Email alternative?
Ugly Email flags trackers but the pixel still loads, and it only works in Gmail. Mailshade blocks the request at the network layer via declarativeNetRequest across six clients, so the open never reaches the sender.
Is Mailshade open source like Ugly Email?
Yes. Both are open source. Mailshade is under AGPL-3.0 at github.com/mailshade/mailshade and is actively maintained, where Ugly Email has had little maintenance since 2022.
Does Mailshade work in Outlook and Superhuman?
Yes. Mailshade covers Gmail, Outlook, Office 365, Superhuman, Yahoo Mail and ProtonMail. Ugly Email is Gmail-only, which is the most common reason people switch.
Is Mailshade free like Ugly Email?
Mailshade is paid, starting at $3.99 per month or $19 one-time for the Founders Lifetime tier. Ugly Email is free. The trade-off is real blocking, six-client coverage and active maintenance.
Does switching require exporting anything from Ugly Email?
No. The two are independent extensions with no shared data. Install Mailshade and it begins blocking; you can remove Ugly Email afterward if you no longer need its Gmail icon.