The clock you see on arrival
Lifespan
How long an anonymous address lasts
Ask whether this letter must still be found later. That answer picks the clock.
Ask how long the message must live
If you only need to copy a code today, three hours is enough. If a receipt, a password reset, or a recruiter will write next month, that clock is the wrong tool. Those letters belong on an alias that forwards to your own inbox.
The temporary clock
The countdown is exact to the second. Extending refills the remaining time to three hours, but one address cannot pass twenty-four hours from the moment it was created. Replacing it builds a new box and destroys the old one, so the clock returns to about three hours. It does not inherit what was left.
The hard cap for one address
At zero it stops receiving
The alias clock
An alias stays until you pause or delete it. The archive runs thirty days from the moment a letter arrives. Pause drops new mail and keeps the address. Delete means that address will not receive again. Letters already stored keep counting down, pause or not.
A simple choice
Done today
Home address
Codes, download checks, forms you will not reopen. Let it expire.
They will write again
Forwarding alias
Orders, accounts, job mail. It lands in your inbox and stays here for thirty days.
Use the home address for one message. Open a forwarder when the sender will write again.