An email hosting service is an Internet hosting service that runs e-mail servers.

Email hosting services, private Internet service providers, usually offer premium email at a cost, as opposed to advertising supported free email or free webmail, such as those offered by Google or Yahoo.

Email hosting services thus differ from typical end-user e-mail providers such as webmail sites. They cater mostly to demanding email users and small and mid-size businesses that do not want to administer their own email servers, usually for administrative reasons, although cost can be a contributing factor. Email hosting providers allow for premium email services along with custom configurations, large number of accounts and use of own domain name.

Most email hosting providers offer advanced premium email solutions hosted on dedicated custom email platforms, in order to provide targeted email service. The technology and offering of different email hosting providers can therefore vary towards different needs. Email offered by most web-hosting companies is usually more basic standardized POP3 based email and webmail based on open source webmail applications like Horde or Squirrelmail. Mostly all web-hosting providers offer standard basic email while not all email hosting providers offer webhosting.

Email hosting services therefore provide a special dedicated service for clients looking for altnerative email hosting options.