Converting from pop to IMAP

[dazed]

Hi all,


At the moment I'm using pop for my email. I have iphone, ipad, MBP and iMac. I'd like to change to IMAP but don't want to lose any emails I got now.

How is best to proceed? Will changing the email setting delete those I already have locally?

Thanks.

 

[asriznet]

Hi all,


At the moment I'm using pop for my email. I have iphone, ipad, MBP and iMac. I'd like to change to IMAP but don't want to lose any emails I got now.

How is best to proceed? Will changing the email setting delete those I already have locally?

Thanks.

You can't just decide to switch. Your email service needs to support IMAP. What email service are you using? Have you check if they support IMAP?

You will not lose emails switching, it's just a setting set on the client device

 

[James_C]

You can't just decide to switch. Your email service needs to support IMAP. What email service are you using? Have you check if they support IMAP?

You will not lose emails switching, it's just a setting set on the client device

That is not quite true. Under PoP if you have not chosen to keep emails on the server, they are only stored on your computer, and you will lose them, unless you archive them first. Check your mail account settings first to make sure you keep copies on the sever. I would make sure your computer is backed up before messing with mail settings.

 

[asriznet]

That is not quite true. Under PoP if you have not chosen to keep emails on the server, they are only stored on your computer, and you will lose them, unless you archive them first. Check your mail account settings first to make sure you keep copies on the sever. I would make sure your computer is backed up before messing with mail settings.

Ouch dang how could I've forgotten about that. I think most default setup is to keep mails on server but then again client side settings can be changed.

Been awhile since I see an active POP3 account

 

[Weaselboy]

Hi all,


At the moment I'm using pop for my email. I have iphone, ipad, MBP and iMac. I'd like to change to IMAP but don't want to lose any emails I got now.

How is best to proceed? Will changing the email setting delete those I already have locally?

Thanks.

The key here is "changing". You don't want to change the existing account. Setup your IMAP email account with whoever the provider is (even if using the same provider you have for pop) then add that IMAP account to Mail and make new folders in Mail in the IMAP account however you want. Now open each folder you have saved mail in for the pop account and drag those messages out of the pop saved folder and into the IMAP saved folder(s). This will move them into the IMAP server for the new account. Once you are sure you have moved everything over, you can delete the pop account.

If you have locally saved pop messages on each device you will need to repeat this on those devices.

Before you do anything, open finder to the user ~/Library/Mail folder and option key drag the entire contents of that onto the desktop to make a copy of it so you can go back if you get sideways with this.

 

[needfx]

That is not quite true. Under PoP if you have not chosen to keep emails on the server, they are only stored on your computer, and you will lose them, unless you archive them first. Check your mail account settings first to make sure you keep copies on the sever. I would make sure your computer is backed up before messing with mail settings.

good advice

 

[Bruno09]

Make new folders in Mail in the IMAP account however you want. Now open each folder you have saved mail in for the pop account and drag those messages out of the pop saved folder and into the IMAP saved folder(s).

You can even drag a whole folder of the pop account onto the IMAP account name in the side bar of Mail : this will add (copy) that folder (and the enclosed emails) to the IMAP account.

 

[Weaselboy]

You can even drag a whole folder of the pop account onto the IMAP account name in the side bar of Mail : this will add (copy) that folder (and the enclosed emails) to the IMAP account.

Nice tip... did not know that. Thanks

 

[Anonymous Freak]

1. What email service is it? (Gmail, Yahoo, Comcast, etc.)

2. If it's not one of the big web-based providers, do they have a web-based system? (i.e. Gmail and Yahoo are obviously web-based, but if using your ISP's email, you may not be certain - most do, though.)

3. Log in to the web-based version, see if your old emails are there.

If they are - just switch your email client from POP to IMAP.

If they are NOT, it will take some extra work.


1. Configure your email client with a SECOND copy of your email provider - this time as IMAP. So you'll have two sets of folders in Mail - one for "On My Mac" one for the IMAP connection.

2. Copy all the email you want to keep from the "On My Mac" folder structure to the IMAP-based folder structure.

3. Make sure the messages copied by checking either via webmail, or on another device via IMAP.

4. Delete the POP listing for your email, leaving just the IMAP.

 

[dazed]

Thanks for the feedback, my email supports IMAP and I'm testing a dummy account now to see how well it syncs across my devices.

I will try creating a second copy for IMAP and copy my existing emails there.

Cheers.