Forum Discussion
Windows Mail App does not work with Gmail accounts
The recent update to the Mail App for Windows 10 (Version 16005.12827.20200.0) has caused numerous problems with the Gmail integration. Sent mails are not appearing in the Sent Mail folder - instead they often appear in the Spam folder; attachments on incoming emails are missing.
In addition the Draw functionality has been removed but no warning about this was given.
Can someone share what is happening here and if the Gmail problems can be resolved?
Many thanks,
Phil
PhilC43 I wrote a post about this problem and with the solution I found. It is in Italian but you can easily translate with your browser 😉
Just setting up a new Win 10 laptop and activated the Win10 Mail app for my Gmail account. Noticed that it imported all my Gmail folders I had set up, but it failed to populate those folders with any of the messages that were in them
Is there a way to get that fixed, or will I need to move them into the folders manually?
Hi enzocontini
Thanks for your blog and it worked for me on my Windows 10 Pro.- Thanks for your comment! I'm glad to know that I've been helping you
- This was very helpful and detailed. Only wish the screens could have been translated as well. Thank you for helping us resolve a really big issue.
You can add Gmail accounts to Windows 10 Mail using IMAP instead of Google.
The Google link returns an error so adding Gmail accounts as IMAP works but you need to ENABLE IMAP in your GMAIL SETTINGS.
IMAP must be enabled in Gmail before you can connect your account.
In a browser, go to Gmail.com
Select> Settings
Select the Forwarding and POP/IMAP tab.
Under IMAP Access, select Enable IMAP.
Select Save Changes.
Google removed the security settings for less secure apps so now this is all you have to do in order to add Gmail accounts to Windows 10 Mail when you get errors using the old method.
I have done some more research into this.
The latest version of Windows Mail has broken the settings for Gmail. The automated method for adding the account using the Google link provided by the Mail app no longer works.
The best way to work around this is to remove the Gmail account from the Mail app and then re-add it manually via the Other Account POP/IMAP route using the IMAP settings as described in Gmail help: https://support.google.com/mail/answer/7126229?hl=en
One other thing you may have to do is change a security setting in Google to allow access to less secure apps. Google now considers the Windows Mail App a less secure app and therefore blocks it from doing some tasks. If you are concerned with this and while we wait for Microsoft to sort this out it might be safest to only use Gmail via a browser using mail.google.com
Hope this helps,
Phil C
Insider MVP
So I am having this same issue with the Sent Mail folder not updating for Gmail accounts (only) since the June 2nd update of Windows 10 and the Windows 10 mail app.
I deleted my gmail account and recreated it using the manual settings described in your prior solution. No difference, sent mail only is populated when emails sent from browser, not the windows 10 mail app.
Any idea when Microsoft and Gmail is going work together and send out a bug fix?
I suggest you open the mail app. Click on the Gmail account and right-click on the account and select account settings. You need to click on mail change mailbox sync settings and make sure that the email sync option is checked.
If the issue still persists, let's try the below methods and check if it helps to resolve the issue.
Method 1: I would suggest you run the Troubleshooter for Windows App and see if it helps to resolve the issue.
Windows 10 Apps troubleshooter: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/run-the-troubleshooter-for-windows-apps
Method 2: If the issue persists, then I suggest you remove and re-configure the account in the Mail app and check.
Configuring the account should force it to sync the mails.
For reference: Mail app for Windows: https://support.office.com/en-in/article/Mail-and-Calendar-apps-for-Windows-10-Help-cc72af58-c630-43a5-8d75-bcae851565f3
Thank you for taking the time to reply with a detailed but simple response. You're recommendation is very generic and simple and was attempted various times to simply delete and reinstall the account. Did you even take a sample gmail account and try your own suggestion before posting it as a possible solution to so many?
This error, where sent items now go to the SPAM folder and the Sent folder is completely empty (when compared to the actual gmail folders using a web browser to administer mail happened during the last update to Windows 10 Version 2004 as this chain suggests since this after this update is when these folders no longer synced correctly.
Your response says nothing about the Version 2004 update and seems like a waste of time for you to post and a waste of time for those of us working on this issue to read and retry the obvious and what was tried before.
heygbriz I was alerted that someone had posted a reply to your thread. Reminded me that it has been months since I chimed in to point out that the contents of Gmail "labels" do not get populated into their corresponding folders that are set up when you first have the Windows 10 mail app* linked to your Gmail account.
I've also made my own thread on that problem, which no one from Microsoft, nor any insiders such as yourself has responded to. If you are still monitoring this thread, could you give me any suggestions about fixing that problem, or how I can get any help on it?
Would very much appreciate it.
* btw, isn't anyone else wishing Microsoft would give it real name, so we don't have to keep writing "the Windows 10 mail app"? Imagine if we all had to call Word "the Windows 10 word processing app", or Excel "the Windows 10 spreadsheet app", etc. Why can't MS give it a proper, short name?
Smith_J Great response. Used the troubleshooter link, the app updated and everything now fine. Wish I'd found this thread sooner! Thanks for your help. 😀
For those who are facing this problem, make sure update Windows and open Microsoft Store and make sure you check for update and see if Mail app is fully updated.
Then try open it and if problem persist, then open start and search for feedback and open Feedback Hub app and report this issue. If the issue already exist in Feedback Hub, then upvote it.
Also, take a look at:
Thank you. I just updated the Mail and Calendar app from the store and it flew! 🙂
- Happy to have been useful to you!
PhilC43 I like to think that these companies are beyond petty back-stabbing, but I can't help but this this is retaliation for what Google did to SwiftKey's speech-to-text. I wouldn't want to go down that rabbit hole too far, but I can't help but chuckle a bit..... I've spent the last few months uninstalling the updates to the "Google" App. When it updates, SwiftKey loses its mind. Speech to text gets almost unusable, and the dropdown function when typing that lets you tap a word and select from multiple other options.... stops working completely.
It started early last year, right when Covid was ramping up. I got fed up and changed to Gboard but occasionally if I had some spare time and remembered, I would research it here and there. When I was troubleshooting, I reviewed dozens of threads at the SwiftKey site where people were griping at how lousy MS is for letting SwiftKey get so bad. Many, like me, have used it since the early to mid 20teens. It was awesome, then one day it wasn't. It works. It predicts, But does so horribly.
And there are plenty of threads out there that identify the cause. If you roll back the "updates" to the Google app (not Chrome, Now, Gboard, etc... just "Google", the problem goes away and SwiftKey is again one of the best keyboards out there. But why does it cause that problem? And why does it not do the same to other keyboards?
The MS staff HAD to be aware of the cause and how easy it is to resolve...You just roll back the app's updates. But they never say so. Which is why I didn't use it for nearly a year. But now that I have the solution I have my trusty keyboard back.... but they still don't mention it in the threads where people even now are still complaining. very odd......Then I stumble onto this and can't help but think that the problems here have the same feeling of annoyance that SwiftKey users were getting. Coincidence?
- I've found a solution for this problem
to use Gmail in windows app, first login using outlook account, then proceed adding a Gmail account. I know this sounds real easy but it worked for me. I noticed when it was putting my details of the gmail account I wanted to link to the Mail App that it was just putting the name, and missing the @gmail.com off the rest of the address. I know it shouldn't matter, but when I eventually typed the whole address in manually, then it connected first time and is working fine again.
Hi Ian_Brearsbrearsian , I always put the whole address but the matter did not change for this. Personally I think it is better to type the whole address too and choose a general connection instead of choosing that the account is a Google one. I wrote several posts in my blog on this topic ... but now at the end I prefer to use Outlook client on my PC.
Hi, I found the solution,
Open the google account setting, go to the Security tab then Sign to Google Account, then go to Security then App passwords, enter your password, go to select app, choose Mail, then choose Select device( Windows Computer ) and save the new generated password, Go to mail app in Windows 10 and in Microsoft mail add your account with the new given password ... finished
- You say "go to Security then App passwords" but I don't find this option. I did follow "password" option, but it only sent me to the change-password screen.
I have similar experience. F.e. GMail messages which are unread and AT FIRST appear in Mail App's "unread" filter in "All Mail" folder can be made to utterly disappear simply by moving them from one folder to another within the Mail App. After the move, they are not anywhere in the Mail App, even though the changes will be reflected correctly in GMail via browser interface. It's like the messages get "old" and lose their "hotness" -- changes to message attributes (label, folder, read/unread, flag) are not synched to them by Mail App unless the message is ARRIVING at the time of the change to the attribute. So, absent the message being identical to its arrival state, it is a non-message, and the Mail App no longer sees it.
Personally, I like to keep incoming mail messages in my In-Box until I have acted upon them. So, I'll generally have four or five messages sitting in the In-Box, unread, for a while. With any other mail app, this is fine; they sit there. With Microsoft Mail App, they disappear. Next time I log in, they aren't seen by the Mail App any more, and I don't know what or where they are. I left them there as a reminder, so I wouldn't have to remember them, I don't know what their contents are, and therefore I cannot search for them by content. I had a job to do; Microsoft hid it from me permanently, and quite effectively; now it won't get done.
There are plenty of other symptoms. The culprit seems to be, that the "folder" concept (used by most conceivably normal email systems) versus the "label" concept (used idiotically by GMail alone for very little good reason except that they like to push us around by demanding we change our thinking habits) are contradictory in some manner or other. Most IMAP setups should be able to handle GMail's "label" concept but evidently Microsoft Mail App cannot do it, and instead of showing messages that it knows are there, it hides them.
This is un-tenable. Microsoft Mail App ought to handle the simplest of GMail messages, but it cannot. I ought to be able to replicate my GMail folders either on a web browser or, via IMAP, in the Mail App, but I cannot, because Microsoft cannot handle GMail's "label" concept (or, differently put, because GMail's "label" concept conflicts with most email systems' assumptions about labeling and foldering).It's the standard default IMAP arrangement. Thanks for your interest and attention.
By the way, I have some work-arounds. One work-around is to go into the GMail browser interface, where I can clearly see all the messages sitting there in the inbox, and there I create a brand new label (can't be one I've ever used before) such as "primary" or "skeezix" and then label the messages in question with it. This will force Microsoft Maill App to "re-see" the messages in question, at least in so far as I can find the new folder (same name as the new label) and then look in that folder for the missing messages. It doesn't force Mail App to "re-see" the messages fully; they still won't appear in the In-Box nor will they appear via a search through the "all mail" label for unread messages. A second work-around is to have the good sense, whenever in the Mail App, to NEVER EVER change the "folder" that a message is stored in. Don't hit "Archive" (this moves things to "deleted/archive" or to "archive" or to "archives" depending on the phase of the moon?), don't drag-and-drop to a new folder (drag-drop will remove FROM the old folder, but not place INTO the new folder, thus accomplishing the disappearment of the message(s)). Third work-around is to find unread messages, but you have to use a trick to find them. Mail App won't find them properly. Instead, you must search in "all mail" for "is:unread" text string. This trick alone will find unread messages. I can't just use the Mail App's "unread" filter, that won't work. I have to use the text string "is:unread" to find unread messages. The contradiction in "unread" status -- Mail App won't even find NEW messages that are unread, if I just use its own "unread" filter -- indicates (I think) that GMail puts an "unread" LABEL on the message, rather than actually changing its STATUS as un/read, whereas MS Mail App cannot understand LABELS. So, again, the culprit seems to be, that "folder" (all other sane decent emailers) versus "label" (GMail alone) is inconsistent.
