Choose your IMAP email client settings for Gmail

We recommend the settings below if you use IMAP to read your Gmail messages in another email client, such as Outlook, Apple Mail or Thunderbird.

Outlook

1. Open Outlook.
2. Click File Options Mail Save messages.
3. Untick 'Save copies of messages in the Sent items folder'.

iPhone

1. Open your iPhone's Settings app.
2. Tap Mail  Accounts  Add account  Google.

Note: When you discard a draft on your iPhone, it is permanently deleted from Gmail.

Thunderbird

Step 1: Open your IMAP settings

1. Open Thunderbird.
2. Click Tools  Account settings.
3. Highlight your Gmail address.

Step 2: Update the settings on each tab

Server settings tab

• Tick 'Check for new messages on startup'.
• Tick 'Check for new messages every 10 minutes'.
• Next to 'When I delete a message', select Just mark it as deleted.
• Untick 'Clean up ('expunge') inbox on exit'.
• Untick 'Empty bin on exit'.

Copies & Folders tab

• In the 'When sending messages, automatically' section, untick 'Place a copy in'.
• In the 'Drafts and templates' section for 'Keep message drafts in', select Other Your Gmail address [Gmail] Drafts.

Junk settings tab

• Untick 'Enable adaptive junk mail controls for this account'.

Apple Mail

1. Open Apple Mail.
2. Click Mail  Preferences.
3. Click the Accounts, Junk mail or Viewing menus.
4. Update the settings.

Another email client

If you aren't using one of the email clients above to read Gmail messages using IMAP, try these tips.

Sending

• Don't save sent messages on the server. Sent messages are automatically copied to the Gmail/Sent folder if your email client uses SMTP.
• Save draft messages on the server if you want your drafts to appear when you open Gmail on the web.

Deleting

• Don't save deleted messages on the server. You can find messages that you've deleted from an IMAP folder in your 'All Mail' label in Gmail.
• Don't change your IMAP settings to save deleted messages in the Bin. When you do this, any messages that you've deleted from your email client will be permanently deleted from Gmail after 30 days.

Junk mail & spam

• Don't turn on your client's junk mail filters. Gmail automatically sorts spam and malware before it reaches your client.