Yet another imap.gmail.com error post

Question

Yet another imap.gmail.com error post

I've been bitten by the dreaded "the mail server imap.gmail.com is not responding" error on my iPhone for the last few months. At first it would pop up every couple weeks and after confirming that all my account settings were entered correctly, the easiest solution was to delete and recreate my gmail account. Slowly but surely, it has become more frequent and is now a daily issue.

I've tried a few things on the Google account side including hitting the "accounts.google.com/DisplayUnlockCaptcha" site; clearing out old (pre-iOS 8.2) app-specific passwords; revoking account rights to the iPhone and re-confirming. The one thing I have not tried is changing my password because the gmail account works without issue on my iPad and OS X Mail. I'm not convinced the issue is on Google's side, unless there's a hiccup in security/authorization between my iPhone and gmail on some level. Third party apps on the iPhone like Spark or Google's InBox connect without issue even when Mail is unable to.

The one thing I've found that fixes the issue temporarily is to reboot my iPhone. First thing in the morning I'll see that the last connection to gmail was made around 3 or 4am. Opening the gmail account in Mail will display the "the mail server imap.gmail.com is not responding" error. If I reboot my iPhone, log back in and open Mail, the "mail server imap.gmail.com is not responding" error does not appear and the gmail account connects without issue. At least until the next day.

While I have a workaround, it's annoying to reboot my iPhone each morning, especially in light of the fact that the account connects without issue in third party apps like Spark and InBox as well as on other devices. I know this issue has left a trail on the internet going back several years with various fix suggestions, but if someone has something other that what I have already tried, I'm all ears... Thanks!

Posted on Oct 5, 2015 9:58 AM

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Answer 1

JonD25

Level 1

24 points

Oct 11, 2015 1:36 PM in response to robbfromnowhere

Wow, this is my exact same issue. Even down to the consistency slowly getting worse till it now happens every day in the wee hours of the morning while asleep. I thought it was just me. Did you figure out any solution yet? Is this a standard "@gmail.com" address or do you use your own domain with Google Apps like me? I just posted my experience here: Consistently get "server imap.gmail.com is not responding" in Mail

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Answer 2

Oct 12, 2015 7:53 AM in response to JonD25

Unfortunately I haven't found a long term solution outside of reboot my iPhone. The account is a standard gmail.com address and I only have Mail active in the account settings (both Notes and Calendar are off).

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Answer 3

Rhonindk

Level 1

4 points

Oct 12, 2015 8:09 AM in response to robbfromnowhere

I installed the GMail app to handle this for now. It is likely 9.0.2 as I have this issue in varying levels on a 6S+ and iMini 3 both on 9.0.2

I am not seeing this on an older iPad 4 running 8.4.1.

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Answer 4

Oct 14, 2015 5:18 AM in response to Rhonindk

Disappointing that you're seeing this on 9.0.x, as I have the exact same issue with 8.4.x on my iPad currently. I was hoping once the bugs were ironed out of 9.x and I upgraded the issue would go away.

Same thing: Gmail works fine on iPhone and Mac, yet randomly (now consistently) the iPad says the server is not responding. Deleting and re-installing the mail account has "solved" it for a while. Beyond annoying, and clearly no priority for Apple.

Off to give them feedback. Again.

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Answer 5

JonD25

Level 1

24 points

Oct 14, 2015 1:44 PM in response to Rhonindk

Rhonindk wrote:

I installed the GMail app to handle this for now. It is likely 9.0.2 as I have this issue in varying levels on a 6S+ and iMini 3 both on 9.0.2

I am not seeing this on an older iPad 4 running 8.4.1.

I've heard from a couple people who have the issue with 8.4.1 as well. Anyone running the 9.1 beta? Any sign it's fixed?

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Answer 6

Oct 15, 2015 12:34 PM in response to JonD25

I first noticed the issue in August. Without being 100% sure, I believe the problem started after the 8.4.1 update (released August 13).

Something I left out of my original post... a gmail account that is unable to receive email due to the imap.gmail.com error, can send email through smtp.gmail.com.

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Answer 7

Oct 26, 2015 1:02 PM in response to robbfromnowhere

It's my exact same situation, too!

Deleting and recreating the account solves the problem temporarily, but it always creeps back.

I just installed the Spark iOS email client on my iPhone, and it doesn't have this problem. Only Mail.

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Answer 8

Oct 26, 2015 7:01 PM in response to robbfromnowhere

is your email setting POP or IMAP?
enable iMAP:http://ipadhelp.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/gmail-setting.jpg

1) Check did you have the right setting/port at: Apple Email Setting Lookup

2) Goto Gmail Setting -> Forwarding and POP/IMAP and turn on IMAP (IMAP if you want to run same E-mail Address on multiple Apple)

3) Close and log all of the app with your Gmail signed in. This include the one on computer and tablet.

4) Go to https://accounts.google.com/DisplayUnlockCaptcha with the iPhone/

Source:http://ipadhelp.com/iphone/how-to-fix-cannot-get-mail-on-gmail-for-iphone-ipad/

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Answer 9

Oct 27, 2015 6:37 AM in response to kennyman99

This is interesting because it suggests the problem is related to having several devices signed into Gmail at once -- that it lies in the ecosystem.

But the instructions are a little bit unclear, especially #3. When you say

3) Close and log all of the app with your Gmail signed in. This include the one on computer and tablet.

do you mean quit the apps? Or delete the Gmail account in the each app?

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Answer 10

Oct 28, 2015 8:59 AM in response to PoozerreooP

I certainly wouldn't rule out an authorization issue on Google's side, but I'm confused to why rebooting the iPhone temporarily clears the issue.

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Answer 11

Oct 28, 2015 9:30 AM in response to robbfromnowhere

robbfromnowhere wrote:

I certainly wouldn't rule out an authorization issue on Google's side, but I'm confused to why rebooting the iPhone temporarily clears the issue.

... and why it seems to creep up at night, among other patterns. FWIW, I use iOS Mail to check both a standard Gmail account and a Google apps account, along with iCloud and another IMAP account. I've had the problem since before iOS9 -- probably for the past four months. I check my mail on other other iOS device (an iPad) and on three Macs.

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