I made a 'clean' install of Catalina. I then made new Smart Mailboxes in Mail, but they disappear after closing and re-opening the app - but the built-in 'Today' mailbox remains or reappears when it has been deleted.
The same thing happens with my 'Rules' - new ones disappear and the 'Apple News' one re-appears.
How can I make it work 'normally'?
Thanks.
iMac Line (2012 and Later)
I was having this issue as well. Clean re-install of Catalina and manually re-installed all apps (not because of this issue but my machine needed a clean sweep), then when re-setting up Mail I noticed that the smart mailboxes would disappear after every restart of the Mail app.
I unticked syncing Mail in iCloud Drive within the "document" options of iCloud Drive config, within system preferences and that has resolved the issue. For me its not an issue as I don't use the iCloud email.
NOTE I already had Mail unticked within the main iCloud options. Now they are both unticked.
I hope that's clear I have attached a couple of screenshots to try to help.
I was having this issue as well. Clean re-install of Catalina and manually re-installed all apps (not because of this issue but my machine needed a clean sweep), then when re-setting up Mail I noticed that the smart mailboxes would disappear after every restart of the Mail app.
I unticked syncing Mail in iCloud Drive within the "document" options of iCloud Drive config, within system preferences and that has resolved the issue. For me its not an issue as I don't use the iCloud email.
NOTE I already had Mail unticked within the main iCloud options. Now they are both unticked.
I hope that's clear I have attached a couple of screenshots to try to help.
I still have this smart box problem.
SmartMailboxesLocalProperties.plist shows the new smart box after I create it.
I quit Mail and the plist file is recreated without the smart box. It does not appear in the Mail app either.
Wild guessing the solution I tried to erase the plist file but it did not help
I am also having this problem, have you found a solution?
The Smart Mailbox problem went away after the Catalina follow-up update.
All the Rules I had before upgrading to Catalina re-appeared aftera couple of days - don't know how!
I have 10.15.1 and no more updates seem to be available at this time, yet my smart mailboxes, rules, email signatures are still missing.
Update: the issue got resolved when I signed out of Apple ID and signed back in. I had issues opening iCloud drive documents earlier which also got fixed.
Smart Mailboxes disappear in Mail after Catalina upgrade
