No red badge for Mail.app even though I have new unread messages

[212rikanmofo]

I'm on iOS 18.6 and for awhile now notice something strange. I never know when I receive new mail cause it never shows the red badge with the number of new unread messages I have. I obviously have new and unread messages. I don't have any focus mode activated. Went to check my mail settings and notifications is showing that I have alerts, banners and badges all enabled. I've tried restarting my phone, updating iOS and still no fix to this odd problem. Any ideas?

 

[Apple_Robert]

Try turning notifications off and back on. I had the same problem and toggling fixed the problem.

 

[aperfectcircle]

Are you using the new ‘smart’ filtering with Mail where it categorises your email as primary, transactions, promotions etc? If so, and apologies if this is an iOS 26 feature (I’ve just noticed it but not sure if it’s new with 26 or not), your Mail notifications badge count may be set up to only show for email categorised as primary.

 

[NoBoMac]

^This. And it's in 18. Option for Primary (which I have on but do not use filtering) vs "All Unread".

And it's on a per account basis as well: Settings > Mail > Customize Notifications > Accounts > [account name] > Badges.

So a couple of things to check on to see if set correctly. And similar to what @Apple_Robert said, even if these options are correct, might want to toggle back and forth to shake things loose: have seen from time to time corrupted settings.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Thanks @aperfectcircle and @NoBoMac for mentioning the primary mail category toggle. I completely forgot about that new option with Mail notifications.

 

[212rikanmofo]

Are you using the new ‘smart’ filtering with Mail where it categorises your email as primary, transactions, promotions etc? If so, and apologies if this is an iOS 26 feature (I’ve just noticed it but not sure if it’s new with 26 or not), your Mail notifications badge count may be set up to only show for email categorised as primary.

Yes I am and I think you're right! Thanks so much for pointing that out. I've been scratching my head trying to figure out why I'm not getting any badge notifications for my mail.