Message Transfer Agent
A Message Transfer Agent (MTA) is a service that receives email and forwards it towards the intended destination.
Contents
Role
Per the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, an MTA receives mail from any of:
- another MTA
a message user agent (MUA)
- a message submission agent (MSA)
If the intended destination is not local to the MTA, it is forwarded to another MTA. Otherwise it is handed to the local message delivery agent.