iCloud email keeps removing my email from the Mac Mail account settings page!

Hi! For as long as I can remember, on my MacBook Pro (2017) 13.6.4 (22G513) in Mac Mail in my iCloud email only (Google/Exchange/AOL/Yahoo are fine - yes I have a lot of email addresses!), the account stays but my email addresses in the Account Information section of the Mail Setting just disappear and I have to add them back in, otherwise I cannot send from them (screenshot attached). Sometimes it's after a few hours, sometimes a few weeks.


This has always been a nuisance, but since I added a custom domain email to iCloud that I use for work it's become completely aggravating--mainly because it will default my work reply emails to one of my personal emails without asking me :-/


Why does the system delete my iCloud email addresses like this? The account is active and online. Over the years, I've tried deleting and adding the iCloud account and numerous other things. Hoping there is a simple fix. It seems completely silly that my iCloud email is the one that is misbehaving in Mac Mail 😂


MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 13.6

Posted on Mar 6, 2024 4:04 PM

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Posted on May 14, 2024 10:14 PM

I have this issue as well. I tried adding all my iCloud addresses (iCloud, Mac, alias) in the hope that at least one would stay but no luck. Random as to how long it takes to disappear. Highly annoying. Hopefully Apple will fix soon.

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30 replies

May 9, 2024 4:09 PM in response to MissSuperYellow

Me as well. Apple has a BUG that was created near the end of April, as that is when this started for me as well. No issues with my IPADs, iPHONES, but my MacBook (brand new M3) with absolutely NO VPN's keeps wiping out my email addresses, so it picks up a Hide my Address and messes everything up. How do we officially report this bug to be fixed?

May 21, 2024 2:25 PM in response to Raptor

Hi @Raptor - maybe your sense of patience and time is different from mine, but from my perspective at least years of the same extremely aggravating issue occurring daily is way more time than I should ever have to give! Mail and iCloud email is part of the Apple family of products and services and yet it is constantly forgetting the email addresses I have attached to iCloud - including my iCloud custom domain email. Waiting is not an option anymore, and as can be seen from the many people commenting, this is a much wider, regular, and prevalent issue. Unfortunately, although deleting my unused Exchange email accounts solved the problem for 2 days, when I opened my Mail today, the issue was back, so it is obviously being triggered by something that is possibly related to Exchange and other things, but automatically reverting my custom domain iCloud emails to a personal AOL email address is not an acceptable process for my workflow, so no I will not be patient anymore. Apple needs to get to the bottom of this issue.

May 21, 2024 3:46 PM in response to MissSuperYellow

Based on Em_1994's post, this is in fact a known Apple server problem that has not been adequately addressed. Based on yours and other posts, it has been going on for a lot longer than I knew. For me, it started maybe 5-6 weeks ago, no problems for a 2-week stretch in the middle of that. Okay for the past 5 days on both MacOS devices. As for patience, I'm not known to have much, but will attempt a cordial conversation with Apple Customer Service when the email addresses next vanish from the Mail settings on my just-now-upgraded MacBook. This is usually first noticed when the reply-to address displayed is not even part of my iCloud account. If I learn anything new from the consultation that is not already posted, I'll share.

May 16, 2024 1:41 PM in response to MissSuperYellow

Reconfirming I have the same issue.

It happened today after three days not using my laptop, but I was using Mail on my iPhone and iPad without issue. It seems to be a Mail app issue Mac OS.

When it happens I go to Accounts and my iCloud account shows this - the email field is blank. (I have Outlook and Gmail accounts too, but this never happens to them).



When I select the email address box I get this:


As soon as I enter my email address it updates and shows my name and email again.

I know there is a way to report bugs directly to Apple (recall that they don't officially monitor these forums...), but I don't remember how... it's been a very long time since I did it.

Hopefully someone here can tell us.

Apr 22, 2024 10:38 AM in response to MissSuperYellow

UPDATE: I spent quite a while with Apple tech support on chat and they felt it was probably because of my Nord VPN… according to them, even if I don’t have the vpn connected the software causes this to happen. It really doesn’t make sense to me, since I have the vpn on my iPhone and that doesn’t lose my email addresses! If it is that, it’s something Apple needs to fix on their end because VPNs are an essential part of many work and non-work environments.

Apr 22, 2024 1:44 PM in response to MissSuperYellow

Same basic problem, but don’t have VPN or Private Relay or any other exotic accessories. For me, the disappearing email settings started a couple weeks ago on both the MacBook Pro (M1 Max 2021) and iMac (Intel chips), just as I was about to finally upgrade from Ventura. Additionally, however, on the Composing page of the Mail Settings, there are Gmail addresses for the iCloud account that do not belong there at all. (There is a separate email account that is not afflicted, as far as I can tell. Both machines are experiencing the same phenomenon, but on the MacBook, I lose the freshly re-entered email addresses every time I quit the app. (Oh yes, even when re-entered, they do not necessarily also become available on the Composing page.) The upgrade is on hold.


Anyone have any new clues as to the problem?

May 15, 2024 7:35 AM in response to vickyvaughn

I don't recall mentioning this same phenomenon (vickyvaughn's post) in my initial entry concerning the problem of email addresses disappearing (and sometimes reappearing) in the Mail account settings, but this is another strange behavior. The Apple Mail account addresses and aliases will often be replaced by email addresses of another account, e.g., gmail, at least on the Composing screen. When that happens, I may not see any addresses on the Accounts screen. At the moment, the Settings are all correct, but that usually only lasts for a day or two.

May 16, 2024 12:07 PM in response to idxjedi

Hi @idxjedi - it's soooo frustrating... I'm hoping to get a few more people on this thread reporting this is a problem so we can take this as proof to Apple Support that's it's not VPN related but an issue they need to figure out and fix. Even if a VPN or third party issue is causing it for certain users, they need to track it down and add the fix on their end!

May 19, 2024 10:02 AM in response to TrevorRu

Thanks @TrevorRu - since your Exchange email is in the "Accounts" list in iCloud to sync your Exchange calendar, that could potentially create the same problem, even though you only have the calendar selected. If it's not too much bother, could you delete your Exchange account from your iCloud Accounts list in Settings and see if the iCloud email goes away? Totally understand if you can't test for this. I do notice that even though the issue has gone away for me (so far), it does take a second or two for the iCloud emails to load in the "from" section of the compose window. Thanks!

May 17, 2024 4:45 PM in response to MissSuperYellow

The Apple server keeps pointing out the wrong things not that “iCloud email” is not working on their server. My friend has told me that there is the same ongoing issue in entire Europe and Africa. The engineers of Apple is not correcting the problem however focusing on the wrong things. “Like the weather that is currently highlighted on Apple - Support - System Status

As of Saturday may 11th on all my devices my emails are totally erased in apple mail app. Don’t have access to a computer however, when I do access iCloud email on safari or Google I still have over a year missing emails. Including daily mail missing. Still apple have not acknowledged the outage. Shame on them.


iCloud email keeps removing my email from the Mac Mail account settings page!

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