How to Use Velo as a Local-First Desktop Email Client

Velo is a desktop Gmail client built with Rust and Tauri. Emails sync to local SQLite with full offline access, instant startup, and low memory. It is keyboard-first with Superhuman-style shortcuts, a command palette, and AI integration for thread summaries, smart replies, and inbox search.

• Project link: github.com/avihaymenahem/velo

Why Velo

Most email clients are slow, bloated, or send your data to someone else’s server. Velo is different:

Features

Email & Inbox

Velo supports multi-account Gmail (API) and IMAP/SMTP for Outlook, Yahoo, iCloud, and Fastmail with instant switching. The smart inbox auto-categorizes emails into Primary, Updates, Promotions, Social, and Newsletters using AI plus rule-based filters.

Composer

The composer uses TipTap v3 for rich text editing with bold, italic, lists, code, links, and inline images. It supports undo send, schedule send, auto-save drafts, multiple signatures, reusable templates with variables, send-as email aliases with from-address selector, drag-and-drop attachments with inline preview, and frequency-ranked contact autocomplete.

AI Integration

Three providers with selectable models. Mix and match per feature:

AI features include thread summaries, smart reply suggestions, AI compose and reply, text transform (improve, shorten, formalize), and Ask My Inbox for natural language search. All results are cached locally so repeated queries are instant.

Privacy and Security

Velo takes privacy seriously with OAuth PKCE for Gmail (no client secret, no backend servers), encrypted password storage for IMAP accounts using AES-256-GCM, remote image blocking with per-sender allowlist, phishing link detection with 10 heuristic scoring rules, SPF, DKIM, and DMARC authentication display with badges and warnings, and DOMPurify plus sandboxed iframe email rendering.

Quick Start

Installation

Download the latest release for your platform:

• Windows: .msi or .exe
• macOS: .dmg
• Linux: .deb or .AppImage

No build tools or programming knowledge required. Download, install, and run.

Account Setup

For Gmail, create OAuth credentials in Google Cloud Console (enable Gmail API and Calendar API), then enter your Client ID in Velo’s Settings. No client secret needed because Velo uses PKCE.

For IMAP and SMTP, click “Add IMAP Account” in the account switcher. Enter your email and password. Velo auto-discovers server settings for Outlook, Yahoo, iCloud, Fastmail, and other popular providers. Manual configuration is also available.

Still reading? These two are worth your time: How to Get Better AI Answers with LLM Council Multi-Model Debate and Lightpanda: Fast Headless Browser for AI Agents.

AI Setup (Optional)

Add an API key for Anthropic, OpenAI, or Google Gemini in Settings. Select which model to use per provider.

[!NOTE]

All AI processing happens via API calls to the provider you choose. No data is sent to Velo’s servers because there are none. The architecture is entirely local-first.

Tech Stack

git clone https://github.com/avihaymenahem/velo.git
cd velo
npm install
npm run tauri dev

Calendar Integration

Velo includes Google Calendar sync with month, week, and day views. You can create events without leaving the app. The calendar integration uses the same OAuth credentials as your Gmail account.

System Integration

The client supports mailto: deep links, a global compose shortcut, autostart with hidden tray option, single instance enforcement, and a customizable keyboard shortcuts system documented in the project’s keyboard shortcuts guide.

What the Community Is Saying

The Threads post about Velo received positive reactions. The developer, @espired0, responded directly: “Really nice surprise to see it here, thank you! Glad you love it! <3" While @zdb_ simply commented “thats a good one.”

Velo by avihaymenahem is for privacy-focused power email users. It solves the problem of slow, bloated, and data-leaking email clients by offering a fast, local-first, AI-enhanced desktop inbox that puts you in control of your data.

If you want a similar local-first approach for media, TeVe is an open-source IPTV player that streams 10,000+ free channels without a central server. And for managing AI agents that can assist with email tasks, Dexter provides autonomous financial research capabilities.

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