European email providers for business: 10 GDPR-friendly options

For encrypted mail, Proton (Switzerland) or Tuta (Germany). For a full European office suite, Infomaniak kSuite or mailbox.org. For plain, standard mail at a low price, OVHcloud, IONOS or Migadu. All host your mail in Europe and work with your own domain. Which is best depends on whether you need encryption, office apps or simply IMAP.

Many EU companies want their mail hosted in Europe: customers ask during procurement, data protection officers prefer it, and it keeps transfers outside the EU off the table. Hosting in the EU is one question. Who owns the provider, and where backups, logs and support staff sit, are others. We note each one where the vendor says it.

How we chose

• Own domain: business email on your company domain. Posteo, a well-known German provider, is left out because it does not support custom domains.
• Hosting region and company: the country of the data centres and of the company, from the vendor’s own pages.
• GDPR and DPA: whether the vendor publishes or offers a data processing agreement.
• Price per user: public prices on the date of this article, with billing basis and currency.
• Apps and IMAP: whether Outlook, Apple Mail and phones work without extra software.
• Migration and AI: import tools, and whether AI features exist and where they run.

Prices are public list prices on 2026-10-05, in the currency each vendor's page showed. “In transit” means mail is encrypted between servers and apps but readable by the provider, like Gmail and Outlook.

1. Proton (Switzerland)

Proton AG encrypts mail end to end, so even Proton cannot read your messages. Business plans are Mail Essentials at €6.99 per user per month billed yearly (15 GB, three custom domains), Workspace Standard at €12.99 (1 TB, drive and docs) and Workspace Premium at €19.99 (3 TB). Its primary data centre is in Zurich, and its DPA allows transfers only to Switzerland, the EU or countries with an adequacy decision. Outlook, Apple Mail and Thunderbird work through Proton Mail Bridge on a paid plan. The Scribe writing assistant is an add-on on Standard and included on Premium.

Best for: confidential mail with a polished app. Trade-off: Bridge on every desktop, and limited server-side search.

2. Tuta (Germany)

Tuta, made by Tutao GmbH, encrypts mail and calendar end to end and hosts them in ISO 27001 certified data centres in Germany. Business plans are Essential at €6 (50 GB), Advanced at €8 (500 GB) and Unlimited at €12 (1,000 GB) per user per month billed yearly, excluding tax. There is no IMAP or CalDAV, so you use Tuta’s apps, and importing old mail is listed only on Unlimited.

Best for: strong privacy at a low price. Trade-off: no Outlook or Apple Mail, and migrating history needs the top plan.

3. mailbox.org (Germany)

mailbox.org, part of the German Heinlein group, runs its servers in redundant data centres in Berlin and offers mail, calendar, drive, office apps and video calls. Business accounts are €1, €4 or €12 per user per month net, with 2, 20 or 50 GB of mail, plus a required service package from €25 per month for up to 50 mailboxes. Billing is monthly with no annual contracts, a DPA is available, and migration runs through the partner Audriga. Optional end-to-end encryption with PGP or S/MIME is available.

Best for: German hosting with an office suite. Trade-off: the service package makes it expensive for one or two people.

4. Infomaniak (Switzerland)

Infomaniak hosts mail solely in Switzerland, and its AI assistant Euria runs in Switzerland too. The Mail Service starts at CHF 2.29 per month; kSuite adds drive and office apps from CHF 1.76 per user per month (Standard), with Business at CHF 7.34 (CHF 3.67 the first year on an annual commitment). It works in any IMAP app and includes an import tool and free migration service. Optional encryption keeps encrypted mail readable only from your account.

Best for: a full Swiss suite with AI that stays in Switzerland. Trade-off: prices in Swiss francs; a sending limit of 500 emails a day on kSuite.

5. OVHcloud (France)

OVHcloud, the French cloud provider, sells several mail products. Email Pro starts at €1.59 per account per month excluding VAT, with IMAP and data in France, but no calendar or contact sync. Hosted Exchange starts at €4.19 with data hosted in France. Zimbra Pro, from €1.82 with 50 GB, adds calendar and contacts on European data centres.

Best for: technical teams that want French hosting and standard protocols, or Exchange. Trade-off: a more technical admin experience.

6. IONOS (Germany)

IONOS, a German hosting company, sells mail with domains. On its German site, Mail Business is €6 per user per month including VAT, with 50 GB, a domain, team tools and monthly cancellation. Every plan works over IMAP and can add an AI assistant in webmail.

Best for: small companies that want domain and mail in one German contract. Trade-off: the country of the mail servers is not named on the plan page, and introductory offers change often.

7. Migadu (Switzerland)

Migadu prices by account, not by user: one account can hold unlimited mailboxes and addresses on your domains. Mini is US$9 per month (US$90 per year) with 30 GB and daily limits of 1,000 incoming and 100 outgoing messages; Standard is US$29 per month. It supports IMAP, POP3, SMTP and webmail, and has no end-to-end encryption. Its privacy policy applies GDPR and Swiss law but does not name the data centre countries.

Best for: many low-volume mailboxes, such as a founder with several domains. Trade-off: sending limits and minimal apps.

8. Zoho Mail with the EU data centre

Zoho is an Indian company that runs an EU data centre in Amsterdam, with Dublin as backup, for accounts on zoho.eu. Mail Lite is €0.90 per user per month and Mail Premium €3.60, billed annually; Workplace plans add office apps. Paid plans include IMAP and the Zia AI assistant, which runs on third-party models the admin chooses. A DPA is available on request from Zoho legal.

Best for: the lowest price with EU hosting. Trade-off: a non-European company, and Zia uses outside AI providers.

9. Fastmail with the EU region

Fastmail is an Australian company that added an EU data region in August 2026: the primary copy of your mail sits in Amsterdam, while backups, logs and debug systems remain in the US. Standard, the first plan with custom domains, is €5 per user per month billed yearly; Professional is €9. It works with any IMAP app.

Best for: an excellent mail service with a partly EU footprint. Trade-off: backups in the US may not satisfy a strict EU-only policy.

10. Skein

Business email on your own domain with an agent that follows up on every conversation. Hosted in the EU. The agent notices when a customer, investor or candidate is waiting and drafts the follow-up in your tone. By default nothing is sent without your OK, from the app or, at launch, from Slack or WhatsApp, and every send has a few seconds to undo. For the contacts you choose, you can let it send on its own. Mail and agent run in Frankfurt, and you can keep reading mail in Apple Mail, Outlook or the Gmail app over IMAP. Your mail is never used to train AI models, and the GDPR data processing agreement is part of the terms, with nothing extra to sign.

It is pre-launch: teams reserve a spot by paying their first month, refundable until they start (pricing). The interactive demo shows the app with sample data. Trade-off: not available yet, and mail only, without an office suite.

No. The GDPR does not require EU hosting, and EU hosting alone does not make you compliant. What it requires is a lawful basis, a data processing agreement with your provider, appropriate security, and safeguards for any transfer outside the EU. A European provider makes the transfer part simpler, because there is none to justify.

• Ask for the DPA and its list of sub-processors.
• Ask where backups, logs and support access are, not only the primary data centre.
• Check where AI features run if you use them: a European mailbox can still send text to a model hosted elsewhere.
• Set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC whatever provider you choose.

Our guide to GDPR-compliant email hosting in the EU goes through the checks in detail.

• Confidential mail: Proton or Tuta, if your team can live without standard IMAP.
• A European suite: Infomaniak kSuite or mailbox.org.
• Standard mail at the lowest price: OVHcloud Email Pro, IONOS or Migadu.
• Leaving Google or Microsoft: see Google Workspace alternatives and Outlook alternatives.
• You want AI that stays in Europe: Infomaniak’s Euria, or Skein’s agent once it opens.

1. 1Pick the provider and sign its DPA before you move any data.
2. 2Add your domain and create mailboxes, aliases and shared addresses.
3. 3Import old mail with the provider’s tool or over IMAP; for Proton and Tuta, use their own import tools.
4. 4Point MX to the new provider, then update SPF, DKIM and DMARC.
5. 5Update your record of processing activities with the new processor.

For the DNS side, see MX records explained and our free SPF record generator.