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“ This message cannot be displayed”

On my 3rd gen iPad Air, the Mail app has started displaying the error message:


This message cannot be displayed because of the way it is formatted. Ask the sender to send it again using a different format or email program.”


about one time in 10 messages. It has so far only happened in emails that I BBC’d myself. IOW, I am the sender. And I can see the first few words of the original email in the sidebar. So it’s a Mail glitch?


Any know the solution? Thanks.

iPad Air, iPadOS 14

Posted on Oct 7, 2020 7:23 AM

Reply
134 replies

Jan 31, 2021 2:31 AM in response to mikemelbourne

Yes, it's very silly of Apple not to find a solution. After all, when I send an email from my new and fully up-to-date iPad, I get this message, so have no copy of it, nor a bcc, yet the message gets delivered and I can read the bcc on WebMail from where I send it back to my iPad and it displays perfectly.

Do Apple really think that it's acceptable that their own machine cannot display its own messages, but can display those messages perfectly when sent back to that machine?? Huh?

Come one, Apple, this has been around for years apparently, it's high time you put some brainpower onto it and solved this very very very silly problem !!!!

The truth of the matter is blindingly obvious, that Apple has simple not been bothered to fix this silly problem - because people like me are so small that we may be safely ignored. We'll buy iPads anyway for other reasons, so there's no need at all to do anything about this. It's of course appaling customer service. But then as you're a very big boy, why should you take any notice of minions like me? And 'all' I have to do to read my own messages is to go to WebMail and send them back. I would like to know from Apple it they think this is acceptable for one of their latest iPads? Is it Apple? What's your view? The reason we need to know is so that we may correctly understand your current attitude to customer service. Are you really too big to answer?

P

Feb 1, 2021 5:12 PM in response to lwalton

Yes same issue here with IPad Pro 2, and yes deleting the offending email and moving back to the inbox does work. But how can an email written on the IPad suddenly be unreadable by that same IPad?????? The main thing is that the offending email does seem to be readable by the person it was sent too, you just can’t read it yourself unless you delete and move back. Hopefully an update will fix the issue - one day soon.

Feb 7, 2021 4:00 AM in response to Blaengwynfi

I have got same problem as others above. Could see/read the emails yesterday on my iPhone 11 Pro. Today when looked at on iPad 11 pro got the cannot display message wrong format. When went back to phone email could see preview but when opened got cannot display message also now corrupting other messages I’ve already received and read if I try to read them again. Deleting to bin and moving back again doesn’t do anything still corrupted. Tried forwarding but still won’t display and ended up losing one message altogether from the system. Don’t know whether it is linked to syncing between the iPad and iPhone both have been updated recently. Before update had it happen briefly with one email a month ago but resolved after couple of days. Also had problems with email two weeks ago when I couldn’t reply to one I had received just stayed in outbox and wouldn’t send said email settings were wrong. Checked them and all was perfect and email setup confirmed them as ok when reset them but email reply still wouldn’t go. Apple obviously needs to sort out their email programme. Notice I still receive their emails ok. Look forward to someone at Apple reading these comments and actually acting on sorting out the problem. Especially as normal ( I.e. non scrambled) email format is a standardised item across the various platforms so people can communicate.

Feb 7, 2021 4:53 AM in response to lwalton

Note that if you can set up WebMail, you will find both your sent and bcc emails and can send a copy back to your device. Otherwise, as this problem stretches back years, we can be sure that Apple will continue to ignore us. Is there any way to get their attention onto this? It is surely BLINDINGLY OBVIOUS that this is an internal software problem - in that there's no problem at all with the messages themelves as sent. Even the little Apple window at the side can read the message and display the first bit!!!! The problem only arises that the e-mail software introduces a display problem itself, when none actually exists. All they have to do is to remove this tiny glitch. Is this maybe too small a problem for them? Is this simple logic too BLINDINGLY OBVIOUS for their complicated brains? Oh dear; what a miserable outfit!! COME ON APPLE ... TIME TO GET YOUR SKATES ON!!! Your response to date is rated 1 out of the usual 5, although I'd prefer to give you a firm '0' for your complete failure to enge properly, sensibly and technically with your customers over this. P

Feb 17, 2021 1:46 AM in response to TyMarRo

Apple's Mail app has been buggy for quite a while now, actually. One other bug is that it keeps automatically fetching e-mails even when it is set to "Manually" in Settings.


Anyway, I noticed this "message cannot be displayed" issue as well, basically only on e-mails that I send to myself from my iPhone or iPad. The bug is still present in iOS / iPad OS 14.4.


When you send an e-mail to yourself via the Mail app, you essentially end up with 2 copies of this e-mail. One arrives into your "Inbox" folder and the other copy stays in your "Sent" folder. The Mail app doesn't seem to correctly switch between the two copies when tapping between them. This might be what is contributing to the randomness of the e-mail being "readable" or "bad".


Anyway, here's what I found out in my testing (it gets a bit complex):


After you send yourself an e-mail from the Mail app, whether the received e-mail is "readable" or "bad" depends on where you open it first.


1- If you tap on the e-mail in the Inbox folder first, it will be random (so it seems).

  • If it is "bad" in Inbox, the copy in Sent is also "bad". If you delete the copy in Sent, the one in Inbox will become "readable".
  • If it is "readable" in Inbox, the copy in Sent is also "readable". If you delete the copy in Sent, the one in Inbox remains "readable".


2- If you tap on the e-mail in the Sent folder first, it will always (so it seems) be "readable". If you then tap on it in the Inbox folder, it will be "readable" there as well.

  • If you delete it from Inbox, the copy in Sent will become "bad".
  • If you delete it from Sent, the copy in Inbox will remain "readable".


So basically the bottom line is this:


If you send an e-mail to yourself and it ends up showing "message cannot be displayed" when you open it in Inbox, go to the Sent folder and delete the copy in there. That should make the one in Inbox readable.

Mar 4, 2021 2:02 AM in response to SocratePro

Since post on 7th Feb not had same problem occur just a couple of emails at the time deleting and reopening didn’t cure problem. Funny thing was if opened on MacBook Pro email was ok until opened on iPad or iPhone then got corrupted when went to read again. Using webmail doesn’t bring up the original email only an HTML version. Think problem is to do with embedded logos in the email and iOS gets confused as to what they are. Bit like me being charged for a picture message when I included a price in a message using the pound sign. It is part of the text keyboard ! Not an emoji etc.

Mar 4, 2021 1:14 PM in response to michaelfromstar

Hasn’t worked for me. Occurred again today with an email containing logo/links to someone’s web site. Couldn’t read on iPad or iPhone says cannot be displayed because of way it is formatted , multiparty/related. Before I did anything with it went to my MacBook Pro and it opened ok on it. But can’t find way of opening it on iPad or iPhone. Except by forwarding it back to myself and it reads ok but original stays corrupted. Has to be bugs in mail app on iPad and iPhone. As once moved or deleted by them MacBook won’t open it correctly, as they have then worked on the email view format. Obviously a problem only apple can solve. So please Apple solve it. We’ve had another update and still not solved.

Mar 7, 2021 3:23 PM in response to lwalton

Since I don’t see any answers

I’ll put my two cents worth in

I recently sent an email to my lawyer and got this message on my email in sent folder, message can’t be displayed...

I came across a reason :

that the recipient server is not accepting the email because of a word or phrase that is blocked.

probably to block spam

if your recipient will accept the email, then your message will appear

Mar 7, 2021 3:48 PM in response to Johnnybell56

I initiated this lengthy thread. In my case, and many others', the problem was occurring only in messages that I had sent and BCC'd to myself. In other words, it was the BCC that "cannot be displayed".

Seems different from your experience, Johnnybell. Did the undisplayable message appear when you got your lawyer to accept the message? How did you come across the reason?

For reasons that are far beyond my intelligence, I have not seen this "cannot be displayed" message for at least 2-3 months.

“ This message cannot be displayed”

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