Tech moves fast! Stay ahead of the curve with Techopedia!
Join nearly 200,000 subscribers who receive actionable tech insights from Techopedia.
Post Office Protocol (POP)
Definition - What does Post Office Protocol (POP) mean?
Post Office Protocol (POP) is a type of computer networking and Internet standard protocol that extracts and retrieves email from a remote mail server for access by the host machine.
POP is an application layer protocol in the OSI model that provides end users the ability to fetch and receive email.
POP is an application layer protocol in the OSI model that provides end users the ability to fetch and receive email.
Techopedia explains Post Office Protocol (POP)
Post Office Protocol is the primary protocol behind email communication. POP works through a supporting email software client that integrates POP for connecting to the remote email server and downloading email messages to the recipient’s computer machine.
POP uses the TCP/IP protocol stack for network connection and works with Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) for end-to-end email communication, where POP pulls messages and SMTP pushes them to the server. As of 2012, Post Office Protocol is in its third version known as POP 3 and is commonly used in most email client/server communication architecture.
POP uses the TCP/IP protocol stack for network connection and works with Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) for end-to-end email communication, where POP pulls messages and SMTP pushes them to the server. As of 2012, Post Office Protocol is in its third version known as POP 3 and is commonly used in most email client/server communication architecture.
![[Free Report] Salesforce CRM vs. Oracle Sales Cloud](http://cdn.techopedia.com/images/uploads/salesforce-vs-oracle1.jpg?mode=fit&width=200&height=150)
![[Free eGuide] No Bugs, No Stress - Your Step by Step Guide to Creating Life-Changing Software Without Destroying Your Life](http://cdn.techopedia.com/images/uploads/w_rafb01c8w.jpg?mode=fit&width=200&height=150)
![[Techopedia Exclusive] Increase DevOps team productivity and efficiency.](http://cdn.techopedia.com/images/uploads/lp-docdownload-devops-guide-aad.jpg?mode=fit&width=200&height=150)
