I have noticed that at times when I check my mail on my iPad, that mail messages will disappear. These are not things that I have rules for on my Mac mail (which is always open), but regular messages. I open Mail, see the message at the top of the list, then it is gone. I just had it happen for my cell phone bill. It was there, then gone. I look in Junk Mail, trash, and even search for it in All Mailboxes, but I can’t find it.
This is really frustrating when I see a message that I want to read and it’s suddenly gone. This is before I can look at the body and read it.
Is this some server culling of possible junk mail, or an expected behavior from IMAP? It does not seem to do it with a particular email address, but most of mine are Apple or gmail.
The only time I see this happen is when I’ve already dealt with that particular message on another platform. When I switch to my iPad I see one or more messages that I’ve just read on my iMac or iPhone and they vanish in a second or two. The delay is a combination of the IMAP cloud catching up with what I just did on the computer and my iPad waking up and checking the IMAP server to see if anything has changed since the last check.
I can also understand how that could happen when a rule on a different computer / device acts on an incoming message, moving it out of the inbox.
Other than that, no, I have never seen something suddenly disappear without explanation.
Check the lower left corner below the index. Does the circle with lines inside have a dark background? If so, you’ve turned the ‘Unread’ filter on. To see all the messages in the mailbox, tap the circle; it should now have a light background and you should see all your messages since you’ve now turned the filter off.
You can adjust the filter by turning it on and tapping one of the keywords describing what is being filtered. You should be able to figure it out from there.
This is a LONG standing problem with the iOS Apple Mail app. It forced me to start using the gmail app a couple of years ago because I kept not having access to or missing important emails exactly as you describe. It happened just often enough that I was always scared. It was awful.
Just this week my dad had it happen on an extremely important email that he needed to forward. Gone. Searching is no use. All mail is no use. It simply will not show up on your device. The only way to solve the problem is to pull up the gmail web interface or web app. (Assuming you are using gmail. If you’re not, let me know, as I always assumed this was a unique problem between the app and gmail.)
Also, I got the impression that the desktop version of Mail.app might have been involved in creating the initial conditions that could cause the message to disappear. Do you use that?
I am using the Mac Mail app. I do not use it often (maybe once a day or two) and handle most of my things on my ipad or phone. I am not sure to which address these things are going to (Gmail or Mac). I am not using Gmail for my gmail accounts at this time. I will try the gmail web app and see what shows up there.
Yeah, this problem (if it’s the same as mine, which I’m 99% sure it is) has existed since before that filter existed. There is literally no way to ever see that email in the app again without* doing something to it in the gmail app (or perhaps some other app).
*just fixed a typo here. It used to say “with doing”
Does rebuilding the database on the Mac have any impact at all on the phone? I wouldn’t have expected so. However, maybe there’s something connecting the two besides the IMAP server?
It has no impact on the phone (or the IMAP server) at all.
Rebuilding the Mail database in Mac Mail is literally rebuilding the physical list of emails on the Mac via a database file stored in your user Library folder.
It will fix absolutely nothing with regard to the gmail problems we’re talking about here.
Ach, my apologies—I just saw Ray’s comment above that he was also using Mail on the Mac, and spaced on the fact that he was originally asking about Mail on the iPad.
Personally, I use the Gmail app in iOS, and Mailplane with Gmail on the Mac, since those feel like they’re direct access to Gmail’s guts, rather than working through IMAP as an intermediary.
I’m sorry. I know this is an ancient thread. However, I have an actual SOLUTION. Make a filter that copies EVERYTHING you get into an archival mailbox. The mail that mysteriously gets dropped from your Inbox (I see it often with mail I read first on my iOS devices) will appear in this archived mailbox, though it does not appear in your Inbox. Saved me many a time.