{"id":4445,"date":"2012-02-27T10:32:38","date_gmt":"2012-02-27T10:32:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/post-office-protocol\/"},"modified":"2012-02-27T10:32:38","modified_gmt":"2012-02-27T10:32:38","slug":"post-office-protocol","status":"publish","type":"definition","link":"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop","title":{"rendered":"Post Office Protocol"},"content":{"rendered":"

What Does Post Office Protocol Mean?<\/span><\/h2>\n

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.<\/p>\n

POP is an application layer protocol in the OSI model that provides end users the ability to fetch and receive email.<\/p>\n

Techopedia Explains Post Office Protocol<\/span><\/h2>\n

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\u2019s computer machine. <\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What Does Post Office Protocol 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 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7813,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"definitioncat":[245],"class_list":["post-4445","definition","type-definition","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","definitioncat-internet"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nWhat is Post Office Protocol (POP)? - Definition from Techopedia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"This definition explains the meaning of Post Office Protocol and why it matters.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Post Office Protocol\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This definition explains the meaning of Post Office Protocol and why it matters.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Techopedia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/techopedia\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@techopedia\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Margaret Rouse\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/#\/schema\/person\/f5dd538e31ee352d105b8af36c4268a5\"},\"headline\":\"Post Office Protocol\",\"datePublished\":\"2012-02-27T10:32:38+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop\"},\"wordCount\":159,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/#organization\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop#respond\"]}],\"articleSection\":\"\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/5383\/post-office-protocol-pop\",\"name\":\"What is Post Office Protocol (POP)? 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