Performance
Designing email for mobile data and unreliable connections
· 6 min read · Egreed Tech, Kigali
Software designed in cities with unlimited fibre assumes the network is always there. Across the region it often is not, and that assumption turns a working day into repeated retries.
Uploads must resume, not restart
Losing a connection at ninety per cent of a 400 MB upload should cost seconds, not the whole transfer. EgreedDrive uses resumable transfers, so the upload continues from where it stopped when the signal returns.
Recently used data should be available offline
The workspace is a progressive web app that caches what you have recently opened. You can read mail and draft replies with no connection at all, and everything syncs when you are back online.
Every megabyte is somebody's bundle
Remote images are blocked by default — a privacy measure that also stops newsletters from spending your data. Attachments are fetched on demand rather than pre-loaded, so opening a thread does not silently download twenty megabytes.
Shared devices are normal
Where a laptop is shared between staff, an unattended session is a real risk. Inactivity locking behind a six-digit PIN, synchronised across every open tab, means walking away from the desk does not expose the inbox.
Put this into practice
Company mailboxes on your own domain, encrypted storage, priced in Rwandan francs.