Difference between To, Cc, and Bcc

When writing emails, do you ever wondered what is the labels to, Cc and Bcc, and what is their usage?.

Are they all same or is there any difference in them?

I never bothered to find the actual usage of them because I never used them. I was happy with “To”. But When I come to the corporate world, I was getting emails having peoples in Cc. This is when it hits me. So let’s understand them one by one.

To

“To” is meant for the addresses the email is addressed to. To who you intend to send the message. This is/are your primary recipient/recipients.

Cc (carbon copy)

“Cc” (carbon copy) is meant for other people that you want to notify of the email. So if Amit writes to Bobby but also wants Chetan to know he’s writing to Bobby, Bobby is “To” and Chetan is “Cc”. Technically there is no difference between these, but people could for example make an email filter so that emails they are only cc’d to but aren’t addressed to them, are moved to a separate folder. The difference is only semantic/conventional, not technical.

Bcc (blind carbon copy)

Addresses listed in “Bcc” (blind carbon copy) are invisible to everyone else. So if Amit instead bcc’s Chetan, Bobby won’t know that Chetan also got a copy of that email. If all addresses are in Bcc rather than To or Cc, then no one knows about any other recipient — you could send out newsletters that way.