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Google Adds IMAP Access For GMail

Wednesday October 24, 2007 4:28 pm PDT by longofest
Google today announced IMAP support for its immensely popular GMail email service.

Previously, GMail users have either had to connect using POP3 in Apple's Mail client or via Google's mobile web interface. However, POP3 has notable limitations when mail may be accessed from more than one client (i.e. a web client and a desktop mail client). In such situations, IMAP is much more suited to the task.

Interestingly, Google appears to be very much aware that some of the people most interested in the new functionality will be iPhone users. They have posted the following video tutorial for how to set up GMail on the iPhone:



The capability of course does not apply only to the iPhone, as users of desktop-based mail clients could use IMAP as well using the same settings.

Additional Reading: IMAP vs. POP (via Wikipedia)
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FunkyJunk
Posted: 60 months ago
Note: I would respectfully ask edesignuk not to lock this thread. I think there are people who would like to discuss the iphone-specific issues surrounding Gmail IMAP support without confusing Mac Mail cross-conversations.
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I set up my iPhone to accept Gmail's new IMAP support, but it doesn't seem to be doing any "push" email. I can only get new emails if I go into the iPhone's mail application or set up automatic polling on the phone. I was under the impression that IMAP specifically implied "push" email, but perhaps not?

For the record, I've set everything up as per Gmail's instruction pages.
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edesignuk
Posted: 60 months ago
IMAP is not Push. It just keeps messages on the server, it doesn't push them down to you though. You still have to "request" new messages.
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Fuchal
Posted: 60 months ago

Note: I would respectfully ask edesignuk not to lock this thread. I think there are people who would like to discuss the iphone-specific issues surrounding Gmail IMAP support without confusing Mac Mail cross-conversations.
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I set up my iPhone to accept Gmail's new IMAP support, but it doesn't seem to be doing any "push" email. I can only get new emails if I go into the iPhone's mail application or set up automatic polling on the phone. I was under the impression that IMAP specifically implied "push" email, but perhaps not?

For the record, I've set everything up as per Gmail's instruction pages.


I havent seen any specific reference claiming that gmail does push imap (it has to support IDLE). But I also feel that the iPhone does not support push imap on just any old imap account - only yahoo. (you dont seem to get the push on/off option for any imap account you set up other than yahoo's) I may be wrong, however. :)
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FunkyJunk
Posted: 60 months ago
IMAP != push.... understood. Sorry to see that, but I'm not going to go back to my Gmail>Yahoo forwarding mess in order to get that back. I guess I don't really mind checking myself and letting the phone poll every 15 minutes if it means that read/unread mail gets updated across both platforms.
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bigandy
Posted: 60 months ago
Google posted a YouTube video about setting it up if anyone needs it.
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billchase2
Posted: 60 months ago
it works GREAT! i now have access to all my "folders" within gmail and everything. quite happy! i've been waiting for this...
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mobilehavoc
Posted: 60 months ago
IMAP 'push' aka Yahoo on iPhone is done using IMAP_IDLE which is usually supported out of box with any IMAP implementation. However, iPhone's IMAP support doesn't work with IMAP_IDLE for any IMAP account except for Yahoo right now.

Basically IMAP_IDLE leaves the connection to the IMAP server open and receives notification from the server when new mail arrives. I have a personal IMAP account that works this way in Outlook but not on iPhone.
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ClemTiger0408
Posted: 60 months ago
I really wish Google would get on the ball and add IMAP to my account! I'm dying to get this working!
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x0lliex
Posted: 60 months ago
My very old gmail account from May 2004 has IMAP enabled. I have just set it up on the iPhone and it is so much better than pop. I didn't have to go through and mark every single email as read, they already arrived read (as they have obviously been read already). I can also see all of my folders and can actually delete stuff from the phone. My other gmail account from December 2004 has yet to get IMAP support.
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philhyde
Posted: 60 months ago
You get what you pay for! :D

I really wish Google would get on the ball and add IMAP to my account! I'm dying to get this working!

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