Email slow when downloading from iCloud

Hi timcald,

Understood. Which type of network are your devices connected to? For example, is this a private Wi-Fi network in your home, or a shared network like you would find in an office or university? Are any of your devices connected to a VPN network?

From what you're describing, it doesn't sound like there are any problems with the account or the devices, since they are able to access the email account, however, the network connection plays a large role in how the devices receive information.

If you're using your own router, adjusting the settings may help as well.

Recommended settings for Wi-Fi routers and access points

All the best.

Hi timcald,

Got it! Do you have problems receiving mail from any other accounts? If not, how much free space do you currently have available in iCloud? We'd like to try working through the suggestions in the article below, and see if they isolate the problem a little more.

If iCloud Mail isn't working

Have a great day.

Hi timcald,

We understand that you're running into some problems viewing your iCloud email, and we'd like to help. To get started, are the email messages not downloading to the devices at all, or is there a delay after you ask the Mail app to check for new messages? Which of the devices currently contains the majority of the iCloud emails? This will help us better determine if there is a network issue, account issue, or if the problem is related to the device itself. The steps in the article below may also help.

If you can't receive email on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

Please let us know what you find, and we'll go from there.

Have a great day.

I'm also having horribly slow performance in Mail recently. I'm running Big Sur (11.3). I've tried with my local WiFi and using my iPhone (with LTE) as a hotspot; there is no apparent performance difference. Browsing web pages and streaming videos is working fine, so it doesn't appear to be a general network performance problem.

If I open the Activity window in Mail, it shows progress bars for "Moving Messages", "Checking for mail...", "Downloading Messages". The Moving Messages progresses very slowly; it took 1 minute 17 seconds to go from "8 of 98" to "9 of 98". Downloading Messages hasn't changed in the last several minutes (347 of 509). Looking in Activity Monitor in the Network tab, it shows pulses of activity about every 20 seconds, with almost nothing in between. The Sent Packets and Rcvd Packets columns for Mail change by maybe 1 or 2 packets every 10+ seconds.

Mail's % CPU is mostly 0.0, with brief jumps to 0.1 every few seconds. The various Mail Web Content, Mail Networking, MailCacheDelete processes are all consistently at 0.0% The system is consistently around 95% idle. So it doesn't look like anything is CPU bound.

I tried moving aside the ~/Library/Mail/V8/MailData/Envelope Index* files (while Mail was not running), and that did not make any difference.

I'd be glad to gather logs or samples, if you (Apple) will tell me how to gather the data you want, and where to send it.

Add an updated to my iCloud and Apple ID password.

I have the same issue. Mail shows up in the iCloud inbox, I click on it and it literally takes 2 or 3 minutes for even a small message. I have other accounts on gmail and other providers and there are zero issues with them. This appears to be an icloud server issue or something.

That is exactly what I see. I have the same issue on my iPhone as on my mail app on my Windows computer. Both take FOREVER to load. I don't have that problem with my other email providers on either device. They load instantly.

I should note that clicking on the subject of a recently received message results in a spinner and the word "Loading", which often lasts seconds to minutes. In Preferences > Viewing, I have "Load remote content in messages" unchecked. When I click the "Load remote content" button at the top of a message's content, that remote content loads within a fraction of a second. Again, suggests that my network connection is OK, and it's the interactions with Apple's mail servers that seem to be slow.

I see the same slowness in loading message content on my iPhone (either over WiFi or LTE) or iPad. For example, if I read some messages on my iPhone, they get marked as read there. But if I then go over to my Mac within a few minutes, they still appear unread. The message status seems to take a long time to synchronize. Likewise, deleting messages on one device (iPhone, iPad, or Mac) takes a long time (minutes to tens of minutes) to be reflected on my other devices.

At this point, I'm receiving junk emails faster than Mail can delete them. :-(

Mine too! Having issues for a few weeks. No-one seems to be able to resolve. Spoke with customer service multiple times to no avail. Messages come in all at once, or not at all. Sometimes I show a couple of new email notifications, but no email in inbox. When they do finally come through they take forever to download. Sometimes just sending a small email, can’t send due to server connectivity issues and failures. I’ve had my Mac email for almost 14 years, and never seen such issues. Maybe it’s time to walk away from Apple :(

I certainly don't want to walk away from Apple, but I would love to see them handle these situations better. There's an overwhelming number of people reporting this issue and they haven't acknowledged any problems. If they would acknowledge that they're investigating the issue and offer some soft of credit on iCloud fees, I would be happy. I know they will eventually solve the problem.

I don’t want to walk away either, but this is getting very frustrating. I have performed every troubleshooting advice from my phone provider, to Apple support. Nothing is working. I have an iPhone 11 Pro, and it is completely up to date on software etc. Oh well, I guess we shall watch this space, and hope they are working on resolving this issue.

I'm having the same issue on my iMac (OS10.14.6). Mail comes up, I click on it, and it takes a few minutes for the message to show up. Turning off "Load remote content in messages" in the Mail Preferences doesn't help.

I am having the exact same problem. Mail is slower than the USPS. won't sync across devices. Was on phone with Apple Support today for 3 hours and no resolution. I has to be a problem on Apple end.

I am using iPhone, iPad and iMac Mail is slow on wifi, hard wired ethernet, & cellular

I have tried other wifi networks with same results.

Was on phone with apple support for 3 hours today. They sent be numerous emails. Each to over 2 minute to get to my inbox and then another 2-5 minutes to download the content of the email.

This problem is on your end not the users. Please address