Since you’re picking a new provider anyway, it’s worth thinking about how you pay. A card ties the account to your name even if the mail itself is encrypted. Tuta and addy.io both accept Monero, and Mailbox.org lets you pay by bank transfer without a card. For aliases, addy.io with any of those works really well.
No, not related, it’s a separate directory. Good one to check too though. Happy to help if you get stuck buying.
For the alias part, addy.io is great, and it accepts Monero, so the alias account isn’t linked to your bank either. Tuta takes it too. I keep a list of email providers that accept XMR if you want to compare more: https://xmrlist.com/businesses/email-providers
One thing worth adding to any comparison is how you can pay. Mullvad, IVPN, AirVPN and Xeovo all take Monero, so the account isn’t tied to your card at all. I keep a list of VPNs that accept XMR, with their KYC policy: https://xmrlist.com/vpns
Yeah, that 19% isn’t the network fee, that’s only a few cents. On RetoSwap the “no deposit” offers carry a big premium because the seller takes all the risk, and Revolut payments can be reversed. If you pick an offer where you put down a security deposit (you get it back after the trade), prices are much closer to market.
The other cheap route is buying BTC or LTC on a normal exchange and swapping it to XMR with an instant swap. That’s usually 1–3% all in, but the exchange part will want ID.
we put together a list of places to buy by country if it helps: https://xmrlist.com/buy-monero
Once you’ve bought some and set up a wallet, the next step is actually spending it, which is where it starts to make sense. I keep a list of places that take XMR, around 1,700 so far (VPNs, hosting, eSIMs, email, shops): https://xmrlist.com/ Paying for something you’d buy anyway, like a VPN, is an easy first try.