Want to highlight a helpful answer? Upvote!

Did someone help you, or did an answer or User Tip resolve your issue? Upvote by selecting the upvote arrow. Your feedback helps others! Learn more about when to upvote >

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

No more "Push" for Gmail and IMAP Accounts in iOS 5

Hello fellow iPhone users.


Ever since I upgraded to iOS 5, I noticed that e-mails always seemed to be a little "late" on my iPhone 4 / iPad 1 but I just got around to take a closer look at the issue today. Turns out, I can no longer select "Push" under Settings/Mail/New Data/Advanced/ for my Gmail (not setup as Exchange) or my IMAP Account. This used to work prior to iOS 5 / iCloud, so I assume something had to be changed during the upgrade.


I've already tried to delete and reconfigure the accounts and I even reset my network settings but had no luck in re-enabling "Push" so far. Now while I know that I could always configure my Gmail Account via Exchange, there are certain disadvantages to that method (I can't choose the folders on the server for sent and deleted mails; downloading of messages doesn't stop at 50) which keep me from doing so. Also, my work e-mail doesn't support Exchange so I have to go with IMAP there.


Is there anyone who has a Gmail and/or IMAP account sucessfully pushing mails in iOS 5? Again, for me it worked without any promblems for both methods prior to the upgrade...

iPhone 4, iOS 5

Posted on Oct 18, 2011 11:32 AM

Reply
18 replies

Oct 18, 2011 3:00 PM in response to loneranger76

Hello Loneranger 76


I have the same issue, i can't access the gmail in my office wifi network, but i can do browsing online but the gmail is not downloading emails i have done several times to delete the gmail accounts from iphone 4, i just (yesterday) upgraded the iphone 4 iOS 5, now i am not able to download gmail emails, but i can download at my home wifi network.


I am also getting the same imap.gmail settings issue, i tried to re-enable it from gmail, still i can't download the gmail emails,


Please let me know if you fixed this issue (imap.gmail setup ).


Thanks in advance & appriciate your help.

Oct 25, 2011 2:25 PM in response to loneranger76

I was similarly frustrated by the fact that IMAP doesn't offer push and that Exchange has other limitations (like poor support for starring/flagging)


Here's the solution I'm using to address the issue: I purchased the PushMail app to get push notification of new emails to my gmail account. Then I set up the gmail account as IMAP.


It's not ideal, but I immediately am notified of incoming emails and get the full benefits of IMAP integration

Oct 25, 2011 2:28 PM in response to loneranger76

loneranger76 wrote:


Thanks for your answer.


As I said, it used to work for me and stopped after the upgrade. Exchange is not at option at this point because of the disadvantages I pointed out and because it doesn't work for my other IMAP account... :/

Not possible. IMAP does not support Push. Never has. The ONLY way to get push is to use Exchange, iCloud/MobileMe or Yahoo. Nothing else supports push.

Nov 4, 2011 6:31 AM in response to KiltedTim

Strictly speaking, you are right to say that IMAP does not support Push (I think there is a P-IMAP protocol that does).


But the feature (i.e. automatically downloading messages from the server as they arrive at the server) definitely exists, and it worked just fine before iOS5 (it still works in the mail on a mac I believe). Your IMAP mail server needs to support IDLE, but assuming that it does, you can receive mail the same way you would via push mail.


But in answer to the OP's question, my understanding is that the latest version of iOS5 no longer supports the IDLE command (just like push, but calling it that apparently causes confusion for some) in IMAP. So until another update, I think we are stuck with fetching every 15 min.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMAP_IDLE

Nov 7, 2011 11:39 AM in response to loneranger76

I sort of have the same issue.


I have seen various explanations to the effect that IMAP is NOT supported by "Push" which I have entirely dismissed as incorrect on the basis that my IPAD 2 (with IOS5) DOES push imap emails from both of my personal domains.


However, my new Iphone 4s (which I have set up exactly the same as my Ipad) does not receive pushed emails despite the fact that "push" is an available option is set accordingly.

Dec 29, 2011 2:46 PM in response to KiltedTim

I thought I didn't have to elaborate on that.


Gmail app solves the Gmail-not-working-with-push "issue".

There's no need to buy an application like PushMail to recieve gmail messages instantly on your iPhone / iPad, the Gmail app does it for free.


I have several mail accounts linked to gmail using a non-gmail one as primary account (let's say it's x@qwerty.com), everytime I respond an email on gmail.com the email is sent as x@qwerty.com as wished. It was impossible to do that when sending mails with my iPhone...the message was always sent as y@gmail.com and there was no way to configure it differently.

That's another problem that was solved when I started using the Gmail app.

Nov 23, 2012 12:12 PM in response to KiltedTim

Well, i don't know, but somehow, when i bought my iphone 3gs in 2009 and synced it with my mac, i was always recieving push mail until yesterday when i reset my settings to default for other reasons. And now ti stopped working. Is that possible that in 2009 iTunes sync set iphone settings mail to exchange? Because before yesterday, in the settings my Gmail was set to fetch manually (not even 15 or 30min) and there was no Push setting in advanced-gmail. Only Fetch and Manual.

No more "Push" for Gmail and IMAP Accounts in iOS 5

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple ID.