Are you tired of giving away your personal e-mail address to those sites you know you'll visit only once? In this mini-guide you can find a way to create anonymous, temporary e-mail inboxes that expire right after you used them, helping you avoid letting your private personal email out for spam bots to harvest.

Photo credit: Mike Flippo

E-mails are the currency of the Web. Each time you register for a service, join a forum, or browse sites which are not secure, you expose your personal e-mail address to be caught in the net of spammers.

What you can do to drastically reduce the quantity of junk messages you receive is to set up an anonymous, temporary e-mail inbox to use anytime you don't want to give away your private address.

Most of the sites which allow you to create a trash-away mailbox are free and do not require registration. You simply go there, create your anonymous, temporary email address in a few clicks and select an expiry date establishing when the disposable email service will delete all the messages you received.

Obviously if you plan to join a site that sends information which may possibly come in handy in the future, do not use an anonymous temporary mailbox, but rather stick to your personal address.

Curious? Do you want to know more about anonymous temporary e-mail services?

In this mini-guide I have collected the best services out there to create an anonymous and temporary, disposable e-mail address.

Here below the set of key basic characteristics that I have utilized to compare the tools I hand-picked and reviewed, so that you can easily find the best disposable email service to fit for your needs:

1. Price: Find whether the service you need is free or not.
2. Registration: Indicates if you need to register to use the service.
3. Duration: Specifies whether the service allows you to choose when your temporary address will expire.
4. Check ways: Some service offer different ways to check your inbox: RSS, web widgets, Firefox extensions, and more.

Here all the details:

Top Disposable E-Mail Services And Tools Comparison Table

Top Disposable E-Mail Services And Tools

• Melt Mail
  
  
  
  Melt Mail is a service that allows you to create a temporary email address that can be used for one-time registrations, or to avoid giving away your personal address. You can even specify how long your temporary inbox will last. Free to use and with no registration needed, Melt Mail allows you to check the expiration of your mailbox in a handy auto-updating pop-up window.
  
  http://www.meltmail.com/
  
  
  
  
• MailExpire
  
  
  
  MailExpire is a service to create a disposable email inbox that you can use to filter the spam at your personal inbox. You can use it to register to those sites you plan to visit just once in your lifetime. Your temporary inbox can last from 12 hours to three months. MailExpire is free and no registration is required to use the service.
  
  http://www.mailexpire.com/
  
  
  
  
• Incognito Mail
  
  
  
  Incognito mail is a clean, simple service to create a disposable email address that you can use for one-shot registration purposes and stop spam to reach your personal email address. Completely free and without registration. You can check your 1-hour temporary inbox via RSS feed or iGoogle gadget.
  
  http://www.incognitomail.com/
  
  
  
  
• Mailinator
  
  
  
  Mailinator is a service that lets you avoid spam messages the easy way creating a temporary email inbox to receive all the unwanted messages you get. Free to use, no setup nor registration required, and you can check your disposable inbox via web, RSS, or the Mailinator widget.
  
  http://www.mailinator.com/
  
  
  
  
• Jetable
  
  
  
  Jator is a free online service that lets you create a temporary email inbox to receive the messages you don't want to be delivered to your personal address. Your inbox can last from one hour to one month. The web interface is available in different languages. No registration required, and you can check your trash-away inbox via web or the Jetable Firefox extension.
  
  http://www.jetable.org/
  
  
  
  
• spambox.us
  
  
  
  spambox.us is a service that allows you to create a temporary email inbox for all your unwanted messages. You can choose an expiry date up to one year. spambox.us is completely free to use and no registration is needed. The web interface is available in different languages.
  
  http://www.spambox.us/
  
  
  
  
• Yopmail
  
  
  
  Yopmail is a free service that lets you create a disposable, anonymous email address. Messages on your temporary Yopmail inbox are stored for 5 days and you can check them via a dedicated Firefox extension or widget. No registration process is needed.
  
  http://www.yopmail.com/en/
  
  
  
  
• temporaryinbox
  
  
  
  temporaryinbox allows the creation of a free anonymous, temporary email address that you can use to receive spam messages. Your disposable address will expire automatically after six hours. The site is available in different languages. Checking your mailbox is possible via web, Firefox extension or Opera dedicated widget. No registration required.
  
  http://www.temporaryinbox.com/
  
  
  
  
• GuerrillaMail
  
  
  
  GuerrillaMail allows you to create a free disposable email address that helps you to filter spam messages. You can check your GuerrillaMail temporary inbox via web or customed iGoogle gadget. No registration required. The web interface is available in different languages.
  
  http://www.guerrillamail.com/
  
  
  
  
• KasMail
  
  
  
  After registering for an account on KasMail, you'll get a temporary inbox to receive and store all those messages that you prefer to keep separate from your private email account. You can decide when the disposable mailbox will expire, or even choose to keep it forever. Free to use.
  
  http://www.kasmail.com/
  
  
  
  
• spamfree24
  
  
  
  spamfree24 is a free service that lets you check a temporary inbox where you can receive all junk mail. You cannot indicate an expiry date for your trash-away inbox, but spamfree24 site says that messages to your disposable inbox will be deleted "after a few hours". No registration is needed.
  
  http://spamfree24.org/
  
  
  
  
• Mailboxable
  
  
  
  Mailboxable is a free service that lets you generate a disposable email inbox for one-shot registration purposes or any other situation where you don't want to give away your personal address. Completely free, you don't need any registration process to use the service. Messages in your disposable inbox are stored by Mailboxable for 7 days.
  
  http://mailboxable.net/
  
  
  
  
• LiteDrop
  
  
  
  LiteDrop provides you with a free disposable email address which expires in 1 hour, although you can get another free hour just by clicking a button. You can use it to receive all those email messages that you don't want to be delivered to your personal address. LiteDrop is a registration-free service and you can check your anonymous inbox via web or RSS feed.
  
  http://www.litedrop.com/
  
  
  
  
• myTrashMail
  
  
  
  myTrashMail is a free service that allows you to create a temporary email inbox to filter spam and any unwanted messages you receive. RSS checking of your inbox is activated by default. Upgrading to the PRO version you can extend the expiry date of individual emails up to 30 days and get extra features like secure temporary email or automatic forwarding to your trash-away inbox.
  
  http://www.mytrashmail.com/
  
  
  
  
• MailCatch
  
  
  
  MailCatch is a free service to create an anonymous, disposable email inbox to filter spam messages. Easy accessible via web or RSS feed, MailCatch inboxes last "from a few hours to a few days depending on the traffic". No registration is necessary.
  
  http://mailcatch.com/
  
  
  
  
• MailEater
  
  
  
  MailEater helps you fight spam creating a disposable email address that will automatically expire after 4 hours you create it. Free to use, no registration nor setup is required to use MailEater.
  
  http://www.maileater.com/
  
  
  
  
• 10 Minute Mail
  
  
  
  10 Minute Mail creates for you a random temporary email address that you can use to receive junk messages instead of using your private address. The inbox auto-expires in 10 minutes. Free to use, no registration needed.
  
  http://10minutemail.com/
  
  
  
  
• TempEMail
  
  
  
  TempEMail is a free online service that lets you create a temporary, anonymous email inbox that will last for 14 days. You can use it to receive one-time messages from sites that you won't visit again in the future. No registration nor setup is required to use TempEMail.
  
  http://www.tempemail.net/
  
  
  
  
• Tempinbox
  
  
  
  tempinbox allows you to create a random receive-only, temporary email inbox. Unlike other similar services, tempinbox does not allow you to choose an expiry period. Completely free to use and without registration. You can access your inbox even via RSS or Atom feed.
  
  http://www.tempinbox.com/
  
  
  
  
• SpamMotel
  
  
  
  SpamMotel is a free, simple disposable email address service. After registering for the service, SpamMotel allows you to create a temporary anonymous email address to help you filter the quantity of spam you get. Although the service is fully accessible via Web, it can be used via a small Windows application as well.
  
  http://www.spammotel.com/
  

Originally prepared by Daniele Bazzano for MasterNewMedia and first published on January 9th 2009 as "Best Anonymous Temporary Email: The Top Disposable E-Mail Services And Tools - Mini-Guide".