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VIP Mail Folder missing on iPhone after iOS 17 Update

iOS 17 official non-beta release, if I add a new contact as VIP then ALL my inbox mail shows up in the VIP folder, if I remove a contact from VIP, then my entire VIP folder goes empty. There are not any filters like “unread” on when everything disappears. It’s completely repeatable, add one VIP, all mail is VIP, remove one VIP, all VIP mail is gone, etc.


[Re-Titled by Moderator]

iPhone 14 Pro

Posted on Sep 23, 2023 12:00 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 27, 2023 9:49 AM

I can confirm this works. The update to iOS 17.1 alone does not fix the problem. Steps to fix


  1. Updated to iOS to 17.1
  2. Remove all mailboxes
  3. Re-add all mailboxes
  4. VIP shows correctly (I did not remove any VIP ahead of time)
104 replies

Oct 2, 2023 12:10 PM in response to Paddle1

Exactly, same here, plus I have zero gmail mailboxes connected anyway. All of mine are Apple and Microsoft based mailboxes. When I was on with supper, we tried removing and adding them back to no avail.


From what I can tell, once the VIPs are completely cleared out, it seems to work for newly incoming VIP mail, but obviously the moment you add/remove anyone as a VIP it resets back to blank again.


This is a flat out coding bug, it’s known, and there’s no workaround.


We need a patch.

Oct 6, 2023 2:54 PM in response to jobiegermano

I didn’t realize this problem until today when I added a new email as VIP, and every email was added to my VIP folder. I’ve played with settings most of the day and finally did a search. I’m glad that I’m not the only one with this issue. So annoying. I went back and deleted the VIP I added, now no “badges” are showing on VIP folder, even though some individual emails have the yellow star indicator in my mail inbox. Sooooo annoying.

Oct 7, 2023 12:44 AM in response to PattyW12

PattyW12 wrote:

I was having the same issue on my iPhone and iPad. I deleted my mail account (Gmail) and then re-added the account to each device. When it re-populated, the VIP folder was working correctly again. I hope this helps you, too.

Tried deleting Gmail from all my devices, unfortunately made no difference.


The only way I have been able to get VIP working was by signing out of all email accounts, iCloud and purchases account. Logging back in just with my iCloud account after resetting networks, then VIP worked.


That is not a a solution for me as I have to have different iCloud and purchases accounts for historical reasons.


If I sign out of my iCloud purchases account, and sign in using the correct account, the issue returns immediately.

Oct 10, 2023 2:38 PM in response to jobiegermano

Just wanted to let everyone know that removing (deleting) and readding my Gmail account fixed the issue for me. I also have iCloud, Yahoo, and Outlook but didn’t have to touch those. It was just the Gmail. If you haven’t tried this, do it. Then you have to close the Mail app and maybe even restart the iPhone before you notice it’s fixed.

Oct 10, 2023 8:33 PM in response to pacopike1

I upgraded to IOS 17.0.3 and I now have the same problem! It was working fine prior to the upgrade and never had that issue before.


I have several mail accounts in my phone. I removed Gmail and then added it back, and now Gmail e-mails don't show up in VIP. I then removed other accounts as well (the ones that showed up in VIP) and added them back. Looks like this fixes it.



VIP Mail Folder missing on iPhone after iOS 17 Update

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