AI overview — Nixt Mail docs

Nixt Mail can use a language model that you choose to draft a reply, reword what you wrote, answer a question about the message you have open, and read a file you point at. AI is off until you set it up, and nothing is sent to a model until you have read a sentence naming where it goes and agreed to it.

This page explains how the pieces fit together. The other AI pages go into each part in detail:

Page	What it covers
AI providers and models	Choosing where AI runs: a model on this computer, your own server, or a provider you have an account with. Keys, model names, checking the connection, and every error message.
AI features	Draft with AI, Say it differently, asking about a file, and the AI commands in the command palette.
The Assistant panel	The panel on the right of the window where you ask questions.
Autopilot	The Autopilot map of the conversations in your message list.
AI permissions	What you allow, for how long, and what any AI caller can and cannot do.

What AI can do

You want to	Use	Where it is
Ask a question about the message you are reading	The Assistant panel	Ask AI in the reading pane toolbar, or View › Show AI Panel
Get a first draft of a reply	Draft with AI	The reply box under a message, and the compose window
Make what you wrote shorter, warmer, more formal, or better worded	Say it differently	The reply box, once you have typed something
Find out what a file says	Ask about this file (the sparkle icon)	An attachment in a message, or a file attached to a message you are writing

AI never sends mail and never deletes anything permanently. Every message still leaves only because you pressed Send.

Before you can use AI

AI appears in Nixt Mail only when all of these are true:

Your copy of Nixt Mail includes AI. Some editions are built without it.
Your edition includes AI, and allows the place you want to run it.
Your licence includes AI. See Licence and updates.
You have chosen where AI runs and filled in what that choice needs. See AI providers and models.

Until then, none of the AI controls are shown: there is no Ask AI button, no Draft with AI, no sparkle on attachments, the AI commands are missing from the command palette, and the Edit menu item reads Search Commands… instead of Search or Ask AI….

To find out which condition is missing:

Open Settings with ⌘, (Ctrl+, on Windows and Linux).
Choose AI and services in the System group.
Find the AI row under Where AI and services run.

When AI is not available, the row shows one sentence instead of choices. The sentences are answered in this order, so the first one that applies is the one you see:

Sentence	What it means
This build has no AI support compiled in, so placing it here would have nothing to switch on.	This copy of Nixt Mail was built without AI. No setting or licence changes that.
AI is part of edition name.	Your edition does not include AI. The sentence names an edition that does.
AI needs a licence. Everything on this device keeps working without one.	Your edition includes AI, but there is no licence on this device.
AI stopped when the licence expired.	Your licence has ended. Mail keeps working.
AI needs a valid licence.	The licence file on this device could not be verified.
AI is not included in this licence.	Your licence is valid but does not cover AI.

Where AI runs

You choose one place for AI. Every AI feature uses that place, and nothing else.

Choice	Whose computer reads what is sent	Does anything leave this device?	Key
Off	Nobody.	No.	None.
Your own server, with a model on this computer	This computer.	No.	None.
Your own server, somewhere else	The server you or your organisation runs.	Yes, over an encrypted connection.	None.
Your AI provider	The provider you chose — Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Azure OpenAI, or any service that accepts the OpenAI request format — under your own account with them.	Yes, unless the address you entered is on this computer.	Your own API key, kept in this device’s keychain.

The Where AI and services run heading says, in one line, whether anything leaves the device: Everything runs on this device. Nothing is sent anywhere except your own mail servers. or, when something does, how many capabilities send data off this device. A row that sends data away is marked leaves device.

What is sent to a model

A request is sent only when you press something: Send in the Assistant, Draft with AI, Summarize with AI, one of the Say it differently choices, or Ask about this file. Nothing is sent while you type.

Every request carries fixed instructions written by Nixt Mail. They tell the model to answer only from what it is given, to say so when the answer is not there, and not to follow instructions found in mail or files, because those were written by other people. Your mail is always sent as material for the model to read, never as instructions.

When you	What is sent
Ask a question in the Assistant	The open message, and your question.
Press Draft with AI	The open message, and a request to write the reply.
Press Summarize with AI	The open message, and a request for a short summary, what it asks of you, and a few short replies.
Choose a Say it differently option	Only the text in the reply box, and which change you asked for. No part of the message you are replying to.
Ask about a file someone sent you	The open message, the text of that file, and the question “What does file name say?”
Ask about a file you are about to send	Only the text of that file and the question. Not the recipients, the subject, what you have written, or any message behind the compose window.

“The open message” means the sender’s address and the subject of the message you have open. You can see exactly what went by opening What was sent in the Assistant panel — see The Assistant panel.

Before the first request to a destination, a dialog shows the sentence you are agreeing to: which host the text goes to, whose terms apply there, and what that destination does with it afterwards. Before a file is sent, a separate dialog asks about that file. See AI permissions.

What is never sent

Other messages. The Assistant and Draft with AI send only the message that is open, never the rest of the conversation, the folder or the mailbox.
Files you did not point at. A file is sent only after you choose Ask about this file on that file and agree. Asking about a message never carries its attachments with it, and a file you did not agree to is not even downloaded for AI.
Your mail passwords and sign-ins. No AI feature can read them.
Your API key, in the body of a request. The key goes only to the provider it belongs to, in the request header, and never appears in What was sent. If a provider’s error message repeats the key back, Nixt Mail replaces it with [your key, hidden] before showing it.
Anything to Nixt Mail. With Your own server or Your AI provider, requests go straight from this computer to the destination you chose.

How answers are handled

Answers arrive as they are written, and Stop ends the request rather than only hiding the answer. On a provider key, you stop paying for the rest of it.
Answers are plain text. Nothing in a model’s answer can load an image, open a link or run anything.
The model is named. Each answer in the Assistant shows the model that wrote it, and the panel header shows where requests go.
Drafts are marked. Text written by a model into a reply box or compose window shows Drafted by model. Read it before you send it. until you change it.
Failures are Nixt Mail’s words, not the model’s. If a request fails, the message says which host was involved and what to do. See the error table on AI providers and models.

Turn AI off

Open Settings › AI and services.
Under Where AI and services run, find the AI row.
Choose Off.

The row then reads AI is off. Nothing is sent anywhere for it. Every AI control disappears from the window, and any permissions you granted end at once.

To turn off everything that could send data away in one step, choose All local at the top of Where AI and services run. It sets AI to Off, puts every other capability back on this device or off, and clears the AI address, provider and model name you had entered. See Where AI and services run.

What Nixt Mail keeps on this device for AI

Settings › Privacy and security lists everything Nixt Mail stores. The AI entries are:

Item	Where	What it is
AI provider keys	Keychain	The key you gave for a provider, if you gave one. Kept against that one destination, so pointing AI somewhere else never sends the old key to a new company.
AI permissions	Memory only	What you allowed to be read and done, and for how long. Never written to disk: quitting Nixt Mail ends every one.
Where AI and services run	On disk	Your choices of where each capability runs, including the AI address and model name. Never a key.

The text of your messages is not stored by any AI feature. The Assistant’s conversation and the last request shown in What was sent are held in memory and are gone when you quit.