iOS 27: What's New With the Mail App

[MacRumors]

Apple's Mail app is getting some useful updates in iOS 27, with Apple making big improvements to search and introducing new AI features.

Search

iOS 27 has an overhauled search system that extends to the Mail app. Instead of surfacing results based on keywords and recency, Mail app search ranks results by relevance and intent. Search results that come up in Mail are more relevant than before, so you find exactly what you're looking for.

If you search for "Sprouts" because you want to find a recent order, it'll show your order before it shows marketing emails you might have from the same retailer.

Siri AI

The Mail app has a built-in "Ask Siri" feature. Long press on any email and you can ask Siri to summarize, find an item in the email, track a package, get a flight number, save a photo, and more.

Once you get a response, you can swipe down to enter the Siri interface for asking follow-up questions. Conversations are logged in the Siri app.

Siri can complete tasks in the Mail app too, like deleting all emails from a specified sender or adding information from an email to your Reminders list.

Writing Tools

The Mail app has a Write with Siri interface above the keyboard, which you can tap to get writing help. Siri can draft an email for you, check over an email you've written, help you reword an email, change the style of the email, or give you writing tips.

Write with Siri is able to match your standard writing style, punctuation, and tone, so emails sound more like you and less like AI.

Your iPhone also now flags both typos and grammar errors while you write.

Smart Reply

Smart Replies that your iPhone suggests to you are now tuned to your writing style, which means the one-tap suggestions sound like things you might actually type.

Contextual Suggestions

The contextual suggestions that you see at the top of the Mail app are now available to third-party apps, plus Apple has revamped the design.

An email that includes a flight time or a restaurant reservation has a one-tap button for adding it to the Calendar app. An email with directions may let you see the route in Maps, and emails with tracking information can be tracked with the Wallet app.

Call Context

Call Context is a feature that works between the Mail app and the Phone app. When you call a business like an airline or a retailer where you have a relevant email, the Phone app will show information pulled from that email.

You might see it bring up a reservation number for a flight, or an order number for a call with a retailer. Call Context works on-device, looking at who you're calling and not call audio.

Performance Improvements

Messages in Mail load faster, search indexing is more reliable, and unread badges between platforms like iOS and macOS sync more reliably. Apple also updated list formatting.

Requirements

The Mail app search improvements are available on all iPhones that run iOS 27, but AI features like Siri AI integration, Write with Siri, Call Context, and Contextual Suggestions require an iPhone that supports Apple Intelligence.

Siri AI is not available in the European Union or China, and Contextual Suggestions are English-only at launch.

Article Link: iOS 27: What's New With the Mail App

 

[sniffies]

Years later, and

it's still not auto clearing unread badge for me when clearing it on Mac. Unless you manually open the app.

 

[lefkonj]

The mail app is horrific. Apple should either completely redo it or call it a day and give up to gmail and outlook.

 

[fatihayoglu]

The signatures on Mail app are abysmal. Any corporate signature with a bit of graphic or style doesn’t work properly, people who are in need to use those signatures has to revert to Outlook

 

[goobot]

How about using ai to know what is fake spam and real email

 

[alex2364]

Yet still no push mail for Gmail using the native Mail app.

 

[klasma]

How about using ai to know what is fake spam and real email

Being able to distinguish real spam from non-spam would be more useful. Why would anyone fake spam?

 

[CTinCT]

Apple Mail needs full-throated tagging ability. Much like the the tagging feature that the now-defunct Mailtags offered. One kind of tag for clients and a second kind of tag for projects for a particular client. Can it be that difficult to add that feature?

 

[nacinla]

How about restoring AppleMail's ability to remember folders where you previously saved a sender's emails? I lost that capacity on my MacBook in early 2021 after an upgrade, spent that year on numerous calls with Apple support, including one session in which they downloaded all the OS code on my Mac. The agents chirped that they were escalating my issue, then ghosted me. I gave up. Curiously, this function works pretty well on my iPhone, so it has to be Mac OS that's the problem. This is a huge inconvenience for someone who has to save emails for future reference.

 

[cwm]

The signatures on Mail app are abysmal. Any corporate signature with a bit of graphic or style doesn’t work properly, people who are in need to use those signatures has to revert to Outlook

THis is pretty long instructions but have you tried it? https://matt.coneybeare.me/how-to-make-an-html-signature-in-apple-mail-for-macos-catalina-10-dot-15/

 

[cem222]

Does it crash less frequently?

 

[chuckles235]

Sorry but this app is such garbage

 

[funkright]

Really? I just want a modern snooze function. Thats all. Waiting…

 

[jimscard]

Apple's Mail app is getting some useful updates in iOS 27, with Apple making big improvements to search and introducing new AI features.

Search

iOS 27 has an overhauled search system that extends to the Mail app. Instead of surfacing results based on keywords and recency, Mail app search ranks results by relevance and intent. Search results that come up in Mail are more relevant than before, so you find exactly what you're looking for.

If you search for "Sprouts" because you want to find a recent order, it'll show your order before it shows marketing emails you might have from the same retailer.

Siri AI

The Mail app has a built-in "Ask Siri" feature. Long press on any email and you can ask Siri to summarize, find an item in the email, track a package, get a flight number, save a photo, and more.

Once you get a response, you can swipe down to enter the Siri interface for asking follow-up questions. Conversations are logged in the Siri app.

Siri can complete tasks in the Mail app too, like deleting all emails from a specified sender or adding information from an email to your Reminders list.

Writing Tools

The Mail app has a Write with Siri interface above the keyboard, which you can tap to get writing help. Siri can draft an email for you, check over an email you've written, help you reword an email, change the style of the email, or give you writing tips.

Write with Siri is able to match your standard writing style, punctuation, and tone, so emails sound more like you and less like AI.

Your iPhone also now flags both typos and grammar errors while you write.

Smart Reply

Smart Replies that your iPhone suggests to you are now tuned to your writing style, which means the one-tap suggestions sound like things you might actually type.

Contextual Suggestions

The contextual suggestions that you see at the top of the Mail app are now available to third-party apps, plus Apple has revamped the design.

An email that includes a flight time or a restaurant reservation has a one-tap button for adding it to the Calendar app. An email with directions may let you see the route in Maps, and emails with tracking information can be tracked with the Wallet app.

Call Context

Call Context is a feature that works between the Mail app and the Phone app. When you call a business like an airline or a retailer where you have a relevant email, the Phone app will show information pulled from that email.

You might see it bring up a reservation number for a flight, or an order number for a call with a retailer. Call Context works on-device, looking at who you're calling and not call audio.

Performance Improvements

Messages in Mail load faster, search indexing is more reliable, and unread badges between platforms like iOS and macOS sync more reliably. Apple also updated list formatting.

Requirements

The Mail app search improvements are available on all iPhones that run iOS 27, but AI features like Siri AI integration, Write with Siri, Call Context, and Contextual Suggestions require an iPhone that supports Apple Intelligence.

Siri AI is not available in the European Union or China, and Contextual Suggestions are English-only at launch.

Article Link: iOS 27: What's New With the Mail App

There’s so much more, since mail messages are part of personal context, which means Siri AI - your personal assistant - has access to them from anywhere. You can just ask Siri, without the app being open, things like “Siri, what was the name of the person that sent me the email about going golfing a week or two ago?”

 

[fastasleep]

How about some actually useful Junk/phishing/spoofing detection/filtering etc. My server side spam filters suck, and I'd love if Mail would just take care of it for me. The built-in stuff now sucks.

 

[jimscard]

The signatures on Mail app are abysmal. Any corporate signature with a bit of graphic or style doesn’t work properly, people who are in need to use those signatures has to revert to Outlook

This is because signatures should not have “a bit of graphic” — that’s the fastest way to have your email directed to the Spam folder.

 

[fastasleep]

The signatures on Mail app are abysmal. Any corporate signature with a bit of graphic or style doesn’t work properly, people who are in need to use those signatures has to revert to Outlook

THis is pretty long instructions but have you tried it? https://matt.coneybeare.me/how-to-make-an-html-signature-in-apple-mail-for-macos-catalina-10-dot-15/

That's a bit much, damn. Here's what I do:

Write your HTML until you have a design that's exactly how you want it. Any images/logos etc should be *hosted on the web* with absolute URLs, so they're NOT attached to the actual email! I cannot stand threads where I have attachments for every logo/image in peoples signatures. Open your HTML file in Safari, then:

Mac — Apple Mail:​

• In Safari, select the lines of your signature and copy (command-C)
• In Mail, go to the Mail menu and select "Preferences..." and go to the "Signatures" tab
• Select your mail account on the left, and hit the + button to create a new signature and give it a name.
• In the editor panel on the right, paste your signature
• Be sure that the "Always match my default message font" below the editor is NOT checked
• Choose your signature in the "Choose Signature" popup menu below
• Check the "Place signature above quoted text" option below that, and close Preferences
• Compose a new message. You should see your signature at the bottom.

---

iPhone — Apple Mail:​

• Tap and hold somewhere in the signature area where your name is.
• Use the handles to select all the text of your signature from the very top to the very bottom with each.
• With the popup menu that appears, Copy the selected block of content.
• Now switch to the Settings app and go to Settings > Mail > Signature (at the very bottom)
• In the text field, tap, hold, (and if there’s content here, select it all and delete it) and paste your signature.
• At first it will look slightly wrong so, be sure to SHAKE your phone briefly to bring up the Undo dialog, and select "Undo Change Attributes”
• Go to Mail and compose a new message. You should see your signature at the bottom.

 

[acuriouslad]

Yet still no push mail for Gmail using the native Mail app.

I came here to say, I was finally going to give the Mail app another go to help with Apple Intelligence, yet some things as trivial as this still aren’t implemented. Why?

 

[acuriouslad]

The mail app is horrific. Apple should either completely redo it or call it a day and give up to gmail and outlook.

It definitely feels antiquated and basic.

I think there’s an opportunity here though. If Apple wanted to modernise the web, they could start with email. Every email client renders differently has limitations, etc. when sending emails for marketing the hoops you have to go through. I can see Apple making a new standard that’s secure and private and has all the functionality to bring email into the modern era. They’d go from necessity to the Chrome of email dominance if they gave it attention.

 

[capamac]

I can't wait for Siri to write an email for me. Which will then be delivered. But the receiver won't read it. Instead, they'll have their Siri summarize the bull my Siri wrote.

A brave new world of communicating, where no one actually really communicates. They don't communicate with their own personal voice, nor their own personal style. No human quirks at all. Just GIGO.

 

[InVinoVeritasty]

Not for me. Never ordered sprouts. Never will.

 

[blumpy]

Perhaps it's just me but the search in apple mail isn't very reliable. Often I can find an email in iOS that I can't find or MacOS or vice versa. Sometimes I can't find it in either, but I can find it on the icloud website. They're all horrible at filtering out noise and repeated emails.

 

[jam9]

After so many years, being able to designate a local folder on my Mac to display a proper sent view would be nice. Why is this not an option?

 

[CTinCT]

Perhaps it's just me but the search in apple mail isn't very reliable. Often I can find an email in iOS that I can't find or MacOS or vice versa. Sometimes I can't find it in either, but I can find it on the icloud website. They're all horrible at filtering out noise and repeated emails.

Try:
1 - Rebuilding your mailbox(es). It's at the bottom of the "Mailbox" pull-down menu.
2 - Next, instruct Spotlight to reindex your drive.

I believe that Mail uses the Spotlight index for its search functions.

After you start the rebuilding process your emails may first disappear and then are redownloaded. Depending on how many emails you have, this could take 30 minutes or a few hours. Best to rebuild overnight.

 

[Fowl]

How about fix the attachment icon so it actually shows if an email has an attachment? I know it's hard, and the bug has been there for only 15 years, but maybe?

How about rules which apply to sent emails, not just to received enails, for example to direct them to a folder? Thunderbird can do it.