Email slow to load in mail app with iOS 11

Remove your email account and set it up again

1. On your computer, sign in to your email provider’s website. Make sure that all of your email is there or make sure that your email is saved somewhere other than your iOS device.
2. On your iOS device, go to Settings > Mail > Accounts.
3. Tap the email account that you want to remove.
4. Tap Delete Account.
5. Add your account again.

This may not help with Gmail, but we’ve noticed that trusting the certificate for the certificate authority (if not already a trusted public CA — internal CA for example) that issued the Exchange server certificate seems to help with this issue. To do this, install the certificate (send it via email and open or put on a website for download) then set it as trusted under Settings\General\About\Certificate Trust Settings). With IOS11 it seems you can no longer add an Exchange account on a server that has a certificate that is not trusted.

I took the Advice of an earlier writer and stopped using the Apple Mail app, after taking my phone in and had it tested by an Apple certified dealer that it was not my phine, I then went into my email provider and they did their own And they assured me it was not their servers, I then spoke with my work IT people and they came to the same conclusion as everyone else it was the Apple Mail app they feel that the 11 updates and later are no longer working with my Microsoft exchange server 2007 I abandoned the Microsoft mail app and went to outlook for Apple and my mail is 100% fine coming in faster than ever my home mail still works on the Apple Mail app but my exchange is now on the Outlook app

Hi ! I had the same problem with emails content extremely slow to load from exchange server after updating my iphone 7 to iOS 11.0. Today, I updated to 11.0.1 and everything went back to fast and smooth again. Hope this will help you too...

I found a fix!!! Go to App Store download outlook and choose your product exchange microsoft etc delete old account off the mail settings in iPhone where you first set up your email use the mail through the app works super fast

Apple’s Mail app became slowwww on my iPhone 6s ever since I upgraded its iOS from 10 to 11 a few months ago. The other day I foolishly upgraded my iPad from 10 to 11 too and guess what? Mail became so slow it was futile! So, like I did with my iPhone, I switched to Microsoft’s Outlook for iOS app and all my emails were immediately accessible! I have an Exchange account. Apple continues to have their head buried in the sand on this longstanding bug 🤔

OK, so this appears to have WORKED !!! I can‘t believe it. 🙂 It was a process to go through for sure so give yourself the time to do it and wouldn’t hurt to have apple on the phone to assist (there is one step in the process that if you make the wrong choice you will not be able to recover). Back up your phone, factory reset, restore your back up. Again, would be wise to do with Apple on the phone, between stages you can request a call back (ex. the factory reset takes time, have them assist you with the back up and reset, while it is resetting schedule a call back to assist with restoring from back up then while it is restoring the backup schedule another call back to ensure that once it has reinstalled your mail is working correctly with no lag time with mail Opening). So glad to have this fixed! Happy Saturday 🙂

Your experience and short lived joy at a problem seemingly solved, only to be frustrated yet again, is typical of the experience suffered by many Apple Mail app users on this forum since the intro of iOS 11. It has nothing to do with your hardware.

Ditch the Apple Mail App and switch to one of the many better performing alternatives. As I have mentioned many times before, Edison Mail App is terrific.

Out of desperation, I simply factory reset my iPhone, and did NOT restore it. I manually went in, and set up all my accounts, added my Apple ID, re-installed apps, and treated the device as a new one entirely. It took me well over an two hours just to get emails, contacts and calendars back.

But after close to two weeks, email is back to normal, and iTunes even stopped duplicating playlists. My wife, who got a brand new phone and migrated her data, has the problem. My antique phone is fine.

I think the core problem is perhaps somewhere in the update/upgrade process, and starting from scratch is the only thing that helped me. I've been running lean, too - just email, some news and travel apps, and one single game. But hey - I can email again without my blood pressure spiking and without it being faster to get in the car, drive to my office, check my email, and return home.

Put your device in recovery mode and set it up again

1. Make sure that you're using the latest version of iTunes.
2. If iTunes is already open, close it. Connect your device to your computer and open iTunes. If you don't have a computer, borrow one from a friend or go to an Apple Retail Store or Apple Authorized Service Provider for help.
3. While your device is connected, force restart it with these steps:
   • On an iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus: Press and hold the Side and Volume Down buttons at the same time. Keep holding them until you see the recovery-mode screen.
   • On an iPhone 6s and earlier, iPad, or iPod touch: Press and hold both the Home and the Top (or Side) buttons at the same time. Keep holding them until you see the recovery-mode screen.
     
4. When you see the option to Restore or Update, choose Update. iTunes will try to reinstall iOS without erasing your data. Wait while iTunes downloads the software for your device. If the download takes more than 15 minutes and your device exits recovery mode, let the download finish, then repeat these steps.
   
5. After the Update or Restore completes, set up your device.

This is generally a good "last resort" solution and becky_s22 describes the process well. But to save everyone the trouble, we've tried this on two devices running 11.0.1 and it has not helped. Unlike some of the other posters, we use all IMAP accounts and no Exchange services whatsoever. It appears to be an as-yet unresolved bug in iOS 11, and actually, I see similar behavior in multiple apps - not just Mail (i.e., many apps are slow to load or establish network connection).

I can literally login to my Mac, fetch mail, read my email, maybe send a short message, and logout before iOS 11.0.1 has fetched new mail.

If I watch on my WiFi and see what Mail is doing on iOS while it is spinning waiting to receive Mail, the answer is - not a thing (on the network at least). I see that with Photos, iTunes, and many Apple apps.

I do not see a stall in third-party apps. The couple games I tried hits those ad servers lightning fast. So I suspect it's a big in some library or code common to all the Apple apps.

I do not believe that the "slowing down "issue has anything to do with the atrocious performance of the Apple Mail App. I had an older iPad running iOS 10 but had to replace it in December because of damage. The Mail app was working fine - quick and snappy on the old iPad. The new replacement had iOS 11 pre - installed so there was no turning back the clock. From the day I took delivery, the Mail problems began ( not appearing, slow to appear, retrieving them manually etc ) and there has still been no fix from Apple forthcoming.

In frustration, I switched the Edison Mail App. It is everything the Apple Mail App should be and more. Try it.

What I don't get, is why a 3rd part app works just fine, yet Apple, with all the vast resources at their disposal, cannot get it right.

Correct. The pre installed Apple App called “Mail” where you setup your email accounts. That’s what I am talking about.

From my experience the problem lays between this App and the intro of iOS 11. Never had any issues with the Mail App until iOS 11 and, as demonstrated by the endless correspondence in this forum, Apple appears to be in denial that such a problem exists.

Since I was unable to return to iOS 10, removing the other part of the equation, Mail, and replacing it with a 3rd party substitute, Edison Mail, worked for me.

Maybe there's a common security, or other patch/update that started around the time of iOS 11 first being released. And your MacPro finally got that common update?

As an IT professional for over 30 years, I have 100% conviction in believing that iOS 11.x is the root cause of this problem. The day that I upgraded my iPhone 6s from 10.x to 11.x, the problem with Apple's Mail being slow to load content (often just displaying "LOADING" for minutes) reared its ugly head. I purposely held off updating my iPad for several months after updating my iPhone. Once I found a good alternative email program (Microsoft's Outlook for iOS) that worked reliably on my iPhone, I then finally let my iPad update to 11.x. And guess what - immediately the Apple Mail program became unusable because of the long "LOADING" times... One doesn't need any more proof than that, right?

Again, it may not specifically be iOS 11.x that's the cause - it could be a security or other update - but it would have to be an update that is only pushed out to iOS 11.x devices...

Latest iOS update 11.2.2 seems to work better.