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Problems with mail in iOS 9

I have updated my iPad generation 4 to iOS 9. First the iPad froze when it updated to the OS, I had to press and hold down both buttons for a few seconds in order to restart the iPad.

I have now discovered that the contents of all of my email are missing, the emails are still there but they lack content, it only says "The letter has not been downloaded from the server." The contents of the e-mail is visible the first time I open them, but the next time the content is gone.

How do I recover the contents of my email?

iPad (4th gen) Wi-Fi, iOS 9

Posted on Sep 20, 2015 4:33 AM

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Posted on Sep 20, 2015 3:55 PM

I Have the same problem on my iPad Air. We need help. Seems ios9 is giving a lot of problems.

244 replies

Oct 1, 2015 2:37 PM in response to Shonabc

Thank you for this thread

Also have same problems hoped the IOS 9 2 update might fix it. As an non techie I have now spent days reading your forum.My apple customer service rep and I store genius had also not heard of the problem.

do we just have to wait for Apple to give us the fix? Will report my devices right now

is the only immediate fix to get non Apple devices and go back to android ? I cannot be without records of my emails on my devices.i so regret doing this update.

Oct 1, 2015 6:16 PM in response to Will 616

Excellent summary. Have same issue with POP / iOS9 (incl 9.0.2 now) - some emails are fine but most are not, with little discernible pattern.


FWIW I have a case open with Apple & my advisor reports that he continues to follow up with Apple engineers to communicate the issue/convince them that there's a bug in iOS9.

Oct 2, 2015 6:32 AM in response to janefromrowledge

I run Apple Mail and myMail simultaneously so I can compare the incoming e-mails, after only 3 days, I can conclude that myMail work without problems, no emails have lose their content, Apple Mail is still losing mail content.

Mymail uses Apple Mail Set up so all you have to do when you open the mymail the first time is to sign in with your email account password.

Oct 2, 2015 7:51 PM in response to dannyfromhöllviken

I want to add to this thread and keep it alive because I'm experiencing everything everyone else here is as well. I've phoned apple support and spent a chunk of time on the phone with Apple tech people deleting and reestablishing mail accounts. All to no avail. The same effect happens with both pop & exchange accounts. I do not want to get into a discussion about who thinks which is better. Everyone has their own reasons, many of which of make sense. It's Apple that is the problem, and the problems persists.

I now have a disappearing drafts folder. It only reappears after I create a new draft. The other drafts in are still there when it reappears after saving a new draft. my iPad mini 3 is like a leaky old bucket concerning the retention of email compared to my "abandoned by Apple" 2007 Mac Pro running 10.6.8. So much for the new! Heck, I my iPod touch running ios5 does a better job of mail.

Oct 3, 2015 6:59 AM in response to dannyfromhöllviken

Yes, some older emails downloaded from pop servers disappear, while others persist. Even recently downloaded attachments disappear. Apparently the Mail app still supports downloading from pop servers. But the internal handling of the downloaded messages has forgotten that pop must be treated differently from imap. The logic to check whether this is a pop or imap account has been removed. I suspect that this is a simple goof by a sloppy or ignorant programmer. I've already dumped safari for chrome. Maybe now's the time to get a real email app. A fix from Apple would be nice but I expect it won't restore the missing messages, alas.

Oct 3, 2015 3:19 PM in response to dannyfromhöllviken

I Haven't seen precisely the issue I'm having described anywhere, so thought I'd add it to the mix. This is copy-pasted from my Feedback submission -- thanks for that tip, Will 616!


Since upgrading to 9.0 (and 9.0.1 & 9.0.2), when I open the mail app on my iPad Mini, it opens on a blank page with the error message "no message selected".. To get to my inbox, I have to click <Mail in the upper left corner which takes me to my Yahoo Mail inbox. Very frustrating, esp when toggling between an email and its attachments and/or links. It happens every time I go back to Mail from another app, regardless of whether I do so via the new "back to mail" option on the upper left in Safari or double click the home button and go back to the open mail app that way. I'm running Yahoo Mail STMP.

Oct 4, 2015 3:14 PM in response to Will 616

copied over from other threads so users on this thread aren't left out!

LdyGatr wrote:


No, unfortunately when I woke up this morning the emails started disappearing again. So now I'm forced to set all of my devices to never delete from the server unless/until I delete from the device and I'll have to manually delete from the server as well as downloading to each device.

All,


Sorry to dash your hopes but very early in in this iOS 9 pop issue I deleted one of my accounts, went to the BT email setting page (uk email provider) and setup the account from scratch using the incorrect password trick to allow the selection of pop vice imap. You will not be surprised to learn that after 24 hours emails started to be replaced by the dreaded "cannot download" message.


Several of you have found ldygatr's post suggesting a fix - on one thread I asked how how it had gone after a day or so and her response is posted above. No fix, same as me. Those of you going down the route of deleting and re-setting up I would ask you to 1. Ensure you have set as pop not imap before posting it as a successful solution and 2. You wait 24 hours before posting it as a success. It's bad enough already without us spoofing each other into chicken bones/ ritual sacrifice solutions that sometimes do more damage than good. We need to be precise with our feedback and produce evidence based responses to Apple to aid / speed the solution.

Oct 5, 2015 1:48 PM in response to duhG

I have the similar issues, but not quite.

The drafts (made since the upgrade) are just empty, without the "not downloaded from the server" message. Even address and subject are empty.

As I do most of my mail writing on my iPad mini, I have no back-up of drafts. This is a huge time waster.

My local Apple dealer does not seem te be aware of the problem yet.

Thanks for all the info.

Filled in the feedback form.

(I have a unsupported MacBook 10.6.8 too. I'll send my drafts there for safekeeping, shall I? I don't want to write emails on my iPod or phone!)

Oct 6, 2015 3:34 PM in response to EmAug

TTricky thing with the OS X decision. Currently this is the last safe refuge of our email archive that has been decimated on the iOS devices. Normally I would say upgrade within a day or 2 once it's confirmed there were no major howlers but if you look at the feedback on the osx App Store for El Capitan there is a definite email based trend of dissatisfaction. Given the current iOS issue there is no way I am going to risk our emails on the Mac. Reference macbooks trapped back on earlier versions of OS X it is a balance of risks as there is no doubt that each OS X upgrade contains a plethora of unadvertised security fixes. Right now Yosemite or earlier OS X is the only safe place for pop email users. So as long as you don't go to El Capitan then OS X is the best land most certain piece of advice I can give to pop email users.

Problems with mail in iOS 9

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