Superhuman vs Spark: Premium Speed or Free Beauty in 2026?

Superhuman launched in 2017 with a waitlist (remember when that was trendy?) and a $30/month price tag. The pitch: email should be fast. Like, keyboard-shortcut-for-everything, search-results-instantly fast. It rebuilt Gmail from scratch optimizing only for speed.

I used it for a year when email was basically my full-time job. Going back to regular Gmail after felt like downgrading from a sports car to a bicycle. The speed is real, but $360/year is steep.

Spark came out in 2015 from Readdle as a free Gmail alternative with smart features. It auto-sorts your inbox, has snooze and send later built in, works across all platforms. The design is gorgeous - honestly might be prettier than Superhuman's minimalism.

Used it for 2 years before trying Superhuman. For free, it's absurdly good. The catch? It's not quite as fast as Superhuman, and you don't get read receipts.

Superhuman is obsessively fast. Every action has a keyboard shortcut. Hit Cmd+K and a command palette opens - type what you want to do without touching your mouse. Search is instant - results appear before you finish typing.

Archive, snooze, send later, all lightning quick. After a month, I was hitting inbox zero in under 5 minutes. The speed compounds - save 30 seconds per email, process 100 emails, that's 50 minutes saved.

Spark is good, just not Superhuman-level fast. It has keyboard shortcuts but not as comprehensive. Search works well but has a tiny delay.

The smart inbox auto-sorts emails which saves time, but you're not flying through everything quite as fast. For normal email volume (20-50/day), the speed difference doesn't matter. For 100+/day, Superhuman's optimization becomes noticeable.

Superhuman's killer features: read receipts (see when people open your email), snippets (text expansion for common responses), remind me (resurface emails later), split inbox (VIPs vs everyone else), follow-up reminders. The read receipts are controversial - feels a bit Big Brother - but honestly useful for knowing when to follow up.

Snippets saved me hours answering similar questions. No team features though - strictly personal email.

Spark has smart inbox (auto-sorts important), snooze, send later, email reminders, and team features for shared inboxes. The smart inbox is genuinely smart - learns what's important to you. Team features let multiple people manage shared accounts, which Superhuman can't do at all.

No read receipts though, and snippets are basic. Mobile apps are excellent - maybe even better than Superhuman's.

Superhuman's design is minimal and focused. Clean white background, no clutter, everything keyboard-driven. It's beautiful in a 'form follows function' way.

The onboarding is slick - they literally schedule a video call to teach you the shortcuts. Some people find it too minimal. I loved it because anything extra would slow me down.

Spark's design is more colorful and friendly. The interface feels warmer than Superhuman's stark minimalism. Icons, colors, subtle animations. It's gorgeous across all platforms - Mac, iOS, Android, Windows.

Some prefer this warmer aesthetic. Others think it's visual noise compared to Superhuman's focus. Taste thing honestly.

Superhuman is $30/month, period. No annual discount worth mentioning. You're paying for speed optimization and polish. Is it worth $360/year? If email is a major part of your job and saving time = making money, maybe.

If you're a casual email user, absolutely not. I justified it when I got 150+ emails daily. When that dropped to 50, I cancelled.

Spark is free for personal use. Completely free. Team features are Premium starting at $6/user/month, but most people use free.

You're getting smart inbox, snooze, send later, all the core features for zero dollars. The value proposition is insane. Only reason to pay for Superhuman over free Spark is if speed optimization is worth $30/month to you.