Deleted emails from iOS 18 show as not read in iCloud and on MacBook Pro

I found a solution for my case.

What is the problem

On my iPhone, deleted emails disappear as expected, and the Mail app reflects this. However, on my iMac, these emails remain in the inbox.

Even after updating to iOS 18.2, the issue persists and remains frustrating.

My Solution

I decided to reset all my mailboxes (IMAP accounts) on my iPhone and start again scratch as follows:

1) Delete the IMAP account.

2) Fully shut down the iPhone.

3) Restart the iPhone.

4) Set up the IMAP account again.

5) Keep the default settings for folders (Drafts, Junk, Sent, Trash) on the server (not locally on the iPhone).

6) Testing successfully – everything works fine and continues to do so.

However …

7) Changing the special folders to be stored on the iPhone instead of the server caused problems.

8) Tests unsuccessfully ! I found that emails deleted on the iPhone no longer synced with the server. They disappeared from the iPhone but remained on the server.

Conclusion

iOS 18.x is working as expected only if the advanced folder settings (Drafts, Junk, Sent, Trash) are set to "on the server". If these folders are set to "On my iPhone", the server does not sync changes made on the iPhone.

I hope this can help someone facing the same issue.

My environment

iPhone 13 mini, iOS 18.1 and now 18.2, Apple Mail

Third party UNIX hosting with dovecot IMAP server (no iCloud involved), Roundcube Webmail

iMac M1 macOS 14.7.1, Apple Mail

Apple please

I would have the all years perfect working settings back. If I delete a message on the iPhone it should be deleted from the IMAP account, also if the Trash is set to be on the iPhone. Otherwise (e. g. holiday) if I manage mails for a longer time just on the iPhone, a) the account gets to its quota and b) being back on my iMac I have to delete every single message again.

Additional

If i look directly into an inbox on the webmail of my mail server, it looks like on the iMac. All on iPhone deleted unread and read mails are still there without any change in theirs state.

• No iCloud or iCloud addresses involved

• No relation to macOS Apple Mail

Semse to be a bug in iOS 18.1

I also have this same issue. I swipe an unread email to delete it and instead of deleting it, it hides it until you filter by unread and then it shows up.

It only seems to happen the the first email I attempt to swipe and delete. All the others seem to go away as expected. I use both Google and Live mail and it happens to both platforms.

When beta testing iOS 18, I reported this issue several times but as I can see, the issue isn’t resolved at all.

It does not matter if I’m connected to WiFi or Cellular data. The issue persists. The first email that is unread and is swiped to delete is marked as read and hidden rather than deleted and can be shown again by filtering the mailbox to show unread messages.

This is frustrating!

Same here. I just spoke to apple support, they say that it’s a known issue now, no date when it will be fixed.

Same here with a regular, Unix hosted mail server, neither iCloud nor g/hot-mail.

1) Checking mails on iPhone Mail > move unread to trash > empty trash

2) After still > 1 hour at work on iMac 14.7.1 checking mails and there are alle of them a) in the inbox and b) marked as unread.

If I go back to iPhone doing a reload by swiping down it looks as it should on this device. Again on iMac, restarting Mail and reloading / check new mails there is no change upcoming. This is a mess.

Have you tried compacting the trash folder from whatever device will let you do it?

After IOS 18 when I delete an email from my iMac it goes to the trash on both iMac and iPhone. All is good.

When I go to the iMac mail trash and delete the email., it deletes it from the iMac (good) but NOT from the iPhone trash for that IMAP account (bad!)

The reason is that when you delete trash email in IMAP many servers just 'mark' them for deletion and come along later (who knows when) and cleans them out.

The workaround with IOS 18 is to COMPACT your trash folder on your iMac. Easy to do in Postbox... I don't know about Apple Mail app.

The exact same is happening for me. Before all good, swipe to delete and is in bin and read in all devices, now it is not, what is swipe-deleted is in the bin, but marked as unread on Mac, and is super annoying. I wonder if someone ever test this new software before the release

Same exact issue here. Apple Support has no idea, they asked for a "screen recording." I asked how that was possible given that this was across two devices, and they told me to find a 3rd iPhone to record the deletion on my phone and then over to the Mac to show the result on Mail.

Have noticed the same thing but only on my iPad Air 5th gen. Using Inbox, swipe to Trash (not opening emails) and somehow after a few deleted (trash) emails, about every other email that I selected to trash somehow re-appears. Upgraded to IOS18 about 7 days ago, using Apple on all devices with ICloud email address, first time deleting emails on this iPad. Have not seen this on my iPhone though (XR). Hope this helps! Thanks

Same here - used to delete emailsl from any device (iPhone, iPad, MacBook, iMac) and it would go in the bin - now if I delete it on my phone, it shows in the bin on my other devices but with the dot that shows it's not been read. So annoying! Came on here looking for a fix but to no avail :(