Phantom unread emails: Mail shows 5 unread messages, but there are none...

JSIDDO - thanks this solved it for me!!

I found this solution an another thread and it worked wonders without having to reset ANYTHING!!!

I just had this issue when setting up an email account on my iphone.. I tried everything that was mentioned but to no resolution. I then went into the Email Settings and switched "Mail" to OFF (Do Not Delete Account), then switched "Mail" back ON. This resolved my issue.

@componentgeek,

This worked for my iPhone 5! Thank you!

This worked for my iPhone 5, however I did the following:

Went into email settings and turned email to "Off"

Exited back to home screen and turned off the iphone

Turned iphone back on

Went into email settings and turned email "On"

This cleared the unread email notification, and when I went into email, my old email messages were not there. Therefore, I went back into settings and selected "Show 200 Recent Messages" and then refreshed my inbox, and my old email messages started to come back into view.

This was the only solution that worked for me, tried everything else.

Thank you Joey C! Your solution worked for me!

This did it for me as well, as soon as I figured out how to turn off email. Thanks!

What worked for me:

I have 6 email accounts on my iPhone

To get rid of phantom unread emails (17 in total) I went to settings, turned off email for all each account individually, then turned them back on.

Some say to restart phone after turning off email, but I did not need to.

These phantom emails came about for me because I used the search function in the email app.

Joey C you are a genius! Tried so many things suggested online to no avail...this worked on my iphone 4. Had 2 unread emails that did not exist on my server or anywhere. They are gone and not making me crazy any longer. Thank you for making me less crazed 😝

Thank you, so easy! I had 2 unread phantom emails on my iPad 2 and tried many things, I even turned off the badge icon so it didn't bother me! Your answer worked for me.

Cheers

Message was edited by: Tipsy

Same issue here - happened after doing a search on that particular mailbox (an exchange server).

Switching mail off/on for that account didn't work here.

Sending myself an email did work however.

JAG2121's solution worked for me. Thank you very much for solving this problem that has been plaguing me for 6 months. BTW, this works well for Mountain Lion also.

Thank you this post is still doing good in Apple-land. My iPad had 65 phantom emails that drove me crazy for two weeks and now, thanks to you, they're gone. BTW these phantoms also showed up when I did a search in this mailbox...

Thanks again!

I found a fix (and cause) for my iPad (version 3). The problem was caused when I changed my password, per company time requirements, on all my devices except my exchange email client. During this time, I read mail in my desktop app. When I correct the iPad exchange password, it was out of sync (showing 8 unread messages in my inbox).

To fix it, I:

1. Opened iPad Settings
2. Selected Mail, Contacts, Calendars
3. Selected Exchange
4. Turned mail OFF
5. Selected Done
6. Exited Settings and saw mail was empty
7. Opened iPad Settings
8. Selected Mail, Contacts, Calendars
9. Selected Exchange
10. Turned mail ON
11. Selected Done
12. Exited Settings (noted that mail still showed incorrect unread number)
13. Opened Mail
14. Forced a sync by dragging inbox contents down
15. Messages read was resync'd

Hope this helps others.

Tom

Thank you Tanery,

I had the same problem with a exchange account.

I followed your 15 steps but the first time it did not work.😕

Then I closed the mail program completely and tried again, that worked.🙂

Maybe the mail program should be closed first!

I used a Ipad 4 retina , ios 6.0.1

Many thanks

Al

This fix works but it’s only temporary. The problem happened again a few weeks later. Apple please fix the bug.