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True iCloud push email in iOS 7

MacDevil7334

MacDevil7334

Contributor
Original poster
Oct 15, 2011
2,590
5,923
Austin TX
Since the death of exchange gmail, I have been thinking of switching back to iCloud email. I miss having push email on my iOS devices and don't want to use the gmail app since I also have a work email account on my phone. I tried using iCloud email back when it first came out with iOS 5 but stopped using it because it wasn't true push. By that, I mean new emails push to all my devices fine. But, if I read my email on my iPhone it still showed as unread on my iPad until I opened the mail app. This got very annoying very quickly so I stuck with gmail since you could get true push through exchange at the time.

My question is has this been fixed in iOS 7? I know that iOS 7 introduces synced app notifications across devices and I'm hoping this applies to iCloud email as well. Can anyone tell me if this is the case? Thanks!
 
I don't have the answer to your question but have you tried the Mailbox app?

I was disappointed as well when exchange gmail died, but this app replaces it perfectly for me.
 
It works fine in iOS 6.

Read an email on Mac, it shows as read on the iPad - and vice-versa. Delete works across devices as well. It happens almost instantly, for instance I was watching Mail on the Mac, while on the iPad, I marked a previously read email as un-read. The status changed on to unread on the Mac almost before my finger left the iPad button. Same behavior between iPad and iPhone.

edit: I see what you're talking about now - it's the badge that doesn't get updated on iOS.
 
Last edited:
IIRC Mailbox is gmail only at the moment. I'm trying to avoid a second mail app as I also have an exchange account for work on my phone and would like all my mailboxes in one place.
 
Maybe I'm not as discerning but:

a) Check email at set times per day for better productivity by opening Mail with Push off.
b) Even though GMail is Fetch when Push is on it only takes 30-90 seconds to come in.
 
OP, the behavior you're describing still exists in iOS 7. It bothers me too. I ended up paying for Google Apps and taking out my own domain name.
 
gr8tfly said:
It works fine in iOS 6.

Read an email on Mac, it shows as read on the iPad - and vice-versa. Delete works across devices as well. It happens almost instantly, for instance I was watching Mail on the Mac, while on the iPad, I marked a previously read email as un-read. The status changed on to unread on the Mac almost before my finger left the iPad button.
Click to expand...

If you're NOT in the Mail app, and read an email on another device, the badge with the number of unread mail remains. You have to open the app to get it to update.

That's what he is talking about.
 
i switched over to icloud from gmail. its push function works perfectly fine for me, and i even like the icloud UI over gmail on the website. i have zero issues with it and im glad i switched.
 
The same behaviour exists and I suspect Apple may change it with next update to iCloud Web Services (backend)... Dont see it happening in GM as well :(
 
If I remember correctly, they mentioned about notification sync for iOS7, but since this also requires backend update, we'll what it looks like once it's fully released.

Why no one tries outlook.com? It's fully EAS.

I switched to outlook.com once gmail kill their active sync.

Not a fan of Microsoft, but they deserve good credit for their outlook.com
 
fortheus said:
If I remember correctly, they mentioned about notification sync for iOS7, but since this also requires backend update, we'll what it looks like once it's fully released.

Why no one tries outlook.com? It's fully EAS.

I switched to outlook.com once gmail kill their active sync.

Not a fan of Microsoft, but they deserve good credit for their outlook.com
Click to expand...

Are you able to add contact pic from the web interface now ? It has been some time for me now but it was the biggest flaw IMO
 
I agree for the grieve of adding photo limitation in outlook contact, but I always managed my contact with mac/icloud.

Apple contact management are much better (custom label, notes, relationship, etc).

The one that I recommend only their outlook.com mail (as per topic)
 
MacDevil7334 said:
Since the death of exchange gmail, I have been thinking of switching back to iCloud email. I miss having push email on my iOS devices and don't want to use the gmail app since I also have a work email account on my phone. I tried using iCloud email back when it first came out with iOS 5 but stopped using it because it wasn't true push. By that, I mean new emails push to all my devices fine. But, if I read my email on my iPhone it still showed as unread on my iPad until I opened the mail app. This got very annoying very quickly so I stuck with gmail since you could get true push through exchange at the time.

My question is has this been fixed in iOS 7? I know that iOS 7 introduces synced app notifications across devices and I'm hoping this applies to iCloud email as well. Can anyone tell me if this is the case? Thanks!
Click to expand...

Forgive my ignorance but when did the exchange for gmail stop working?

I'm using exchange for gmail all the time, and it pushed very well.;)
 
keviny said:
Forgive my ignorance but when did the exchange for gmail stop working?

I'm using exchange for gmail all the time, and it pushed very well.;)
Click to expand...

Jan sometime I think .... only works if you kept using the account ever since before its decomission or you have Google Apps Account
 
fortheus said:
If I remember correctly, they mentioned about notification sync for iOS7, but since this also requires backend update, we'll what it looks like once it's fully released.

Why no one tries outlook.com? It's fully EAS.

I switched to outlook.com once gmail kill their active sync.

Not a fan of Microsoft, but they deserve good credit for their outlook.com
Click to expand...

Outlook.com works great on iOS devices. However its only POP on the Mac.

----------
keviny said:
Forgive my ignorance but when did the exchange for gmail stop working?

I'm using exchange for gmail all the time, and it pushed very well.;)
Click to expand...

Support for gmail exchange stopped on Jan. 31 this year. As long as you use devices registered before that date exchange will continue to work.
 
whsbuss said:
Support for gmail exchange stopped on Jan. 31 this year. As long as you use devices registered before that date exchange will continue to work.
Click to expand...

This is true with one caveat: Google considers major OS upgrades to be the same as registering a new device. When I upgraded to iOS 7, I could no longer set up exchange gmail on my iPhone even though I had it with iOS 6.
 
Switching from iCloud to Gmail is not easy if you have a lot of mail already in iCloud, there is no import tool in Gmail that supports importing iCloud messages (and folders ect) - I have tried many times manually in the desktop mail app by dragging mail from iCloud to Gmail and it hangs every time. I have something like 200k emails in iCloud and I can't find any way to get them into Gmail so i can migrate over.
 
SanjeevRana said:
The same behaviour exists and I suspect Apple may change it with next update to iCloud Web Services (backend)... Dont see it happening in GM as well :(
Click to expand...

The reason that this happens is because iCloud Mail just uses IMAP with some proprietary extensions.

IMAP has no concept of "push mail" built in, so it's not possible for device X to be notified when device Y has "read" a message.

That's not going to change unless Apple radically overhauls how iCloud Mail works.
 
I'm pretty sure you could still use gmail push if you have been. It's my understanding that only new gmail accounts cannot be configured as exchange. I'm still using mine on my devices.
 
I'm confused about something

You keep talking about iCloud email and gmail.
So are you talking about an @icloud.com email or a gmail through the iOS mail app. Because they aren't the same thing.

If the latter, it's because of gmail's settings. They have hobbled other apps because they want you to use their gmail app. It's even that way for ages
 
I made a new hotmail account and told gmail to forward my emails to the new account.

And now I have exchange again.
 
joshforman said:
I'm pretty sure you could still use gmail push if you have been. It's my understanding that only new gmail accounts cannot be configured as exchange. I'm still using mine on my devices.
Click to expand...

Only existing DEVICES not accounts, so although it got turned off in Jan for new devices you can continue using it on all your current devices. However once you upgrade to a new phone you won't be able to configure it for exchange.
 
I have my own domains and mail servers so I run imap on all my accounts so that they're all synchronized real-time. Not really push, but meh, my stored mail in folders is organized on all my devices apple and otherwise.

iCloud also has an imap option btw for people looking for server side storage and organization of their email.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 2
 
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