Not receiving emails on iPhone? Top 5 solutions

Like it or not, emails are an essential piece of every iPhone user. Even if you don’t use it for professional matters, resetting passwords and tracking important information are still very much reserved for emails. Not to mention that the livelihood of some users depends on email conversations. Therefore, not receiving emails on your iPhone, or not receiving them as soon as possible can definitely pose a big issue. We have a few things to suggest before you turn to Apple Support. Check them out below.

Table of contents:

1. Check Mail Fetch and Mail Settings
2. Inspect the network
3. Check Notification Settings
4. Delete the email account and add it again
5. Reset All Settings

Why has my iPhone stopped receiving emails?

1. Check Mail Fetch and Mail Settings

The first thing you should do is restart your iPhone. After that, try using any other email client with the same mail account to determine if there’s a server-side issue or if something is misconfigured on your device.

If you can confirm that the emails are not coming through only on your iPhone’s Mail app, the Mail Fetch is an option you should check out. Once there, enable the Push option and set the Fetch New Data to “Automatically”. In addition, check the status of Mail on the Apple Status Check website.

After that, follow these steps to check Mail Fetch on your iPhone:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Mail.
3. Select Accounts.
4. Tap Fetch New Data.
5. Make sure that the Push option is enabled and that Fetch is set to Automatically.

In addition, you can also check if the Mail app is properly configured in case you use iCloud email. Here’s what you need to do:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Mail.
3. Under Default Mail App, select Mail.
4. Select Accounts.
5. Choose the Account that’s causing you trouble.
6. Compare the Settings with the results in the Mail Service Lookup tool. Just enter your address to check if everything is properly configured.

2. Inspect the network

Of course, in order for emails to come through and get fetched from the server, you’ll need a stable network connection. Be that Wi-Fi or mobile data, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that you can connect to a preferred network without issues. Make sure to test this and, if you experience a system-wide connectivity problem, we suggest checking this article for applicable troubleshooting steps.

Disable the VPN if you have it running in the background as it might cause issues with email. Rarely does, but it’s important to reduce the risk. In addition, if you do use cellular data prominently on your device, navigate to Settings > Mail and enable Cellular Data there. That way, the Mail app will be able to use cellular to fetch emails.

3. Check Notification Settings

We can’t tackle this problem without mentioning a somewhat similar one. Getting emails but not being notified about them can be as bad as not getting emails at all. If this is what bothers you, the solution is (usually, at least) rather simple. Just navigate to Mail Settings and check if the Notifications are enabled.

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Mail.
3. Select Notifications.
4. Toggle On the Allow Notifications. Preferably, you will allow Lock Screen, Notification Center, and Banners, too. This, obviously, is your preference. Also, don’t forget to set a Sound.

4. Delete the email account and add it again

If the previous solutions failed and you are still not receiving emails on your iPhone, try removing the mail account and adding it again. This should, hopefully, kickstart the sync and you’ll get all your emails.

Here’s how to remove and add an email account in the Mail app on your iPhone:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Mail.
3. Select Accounts.
4. Tap on the Account you want to remove and then tap Delete Account.
5. Add the Account again in Mail > Accounts and check for improvements.

5. Reset All Settings

Finally, we can only suggest resetting All Settings. If there are no obvious external issues and you went through the above steps, we might be looking at a glitch of a sort. Firstly, update your device in Settings > General > Software Update. If that doesn’t help, Reset All Settings.

Here’s how to Reset All Settings on your iPhone:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap General.
3. Scroll down and tap Reset.
4. Tap Reset All Settings and enter your PIN/password when prompted.
5. Confirm so your device can reset all system settings.

You can also switch to a third-party mail client. I personally use Gmail on iOS and, although it lacks some features, it does the job. Of course, there are so many more mail clients on App Store so there must be one that fits your needs.

That’s it. Thank you for reading and feel free to share your thoughts, questions, or suggestions with us in the comments section below. Your feedback is more than welcome.

Editor’s note: This article was initially published in August 2021. We made sure to revamp it for freshness and accuracy.