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bemije's avatar
bemije
New Contributor
9 months ago

No IMAP connection on iPhone to cox email

I have tried to set up my cox email account on my iphone 12 that has been updated to latest iOS. However, after I input my email address and password, the iphone does not give me an option to connect to the IMAP server. It automatically sets up a POP connection. Any ideas why this is happening and how to set up IMAP on the iphone mail app for cox email?

  • WiderMouthOpen's avatar
    WiderMouthOpen
    Esteemed Contributor

    I think it probably has something to do with the settings detection system Apple mail uses to set up accounts. Is there any option at step 4 of these settings to skip that system? If not, contact Apple. One work around would be to download another email app from the app store. The two I found after a quick search is Spark and Outlook.

    • bemije's avatar
      bemije
      New Contributor

      Thanks for suggestions.  There is no option in settings to skip POP. There used to be that option, but not now.  Another email app is a plan B.  I contacted Cox and was told they have been working with Apple, but it's been almost 2 weeks. I'll try Apple.  Maybe when they transition to Yahoo in our Northern Virginia area, that will provide a fix.

      • WiderMouthOpen's avatar
        WiderMouthOpen
        Esteemed Contributor
        bemije wrote:

        Maybe when they transition to Yahoo in our Northern Virginia area, that will provide a fix.

        Could be. Someone else just posted a issue with webmail in VA.

  • bemije's avatar
    bemije
    New Contributor

    I just contacted Apple support and they said the problem is on the cox side of the email connection. 

    • Darkatt's avatar
      Darkatt
      Honored Contributor

      They are lying. I used to beta test for apple and myself as well as a number of others reported this bug to apple YEARS ago. quick search shows over a million hits for search imap problems on iphone. 

      About 1,260,000 results (0.39 seconds) 

      Search Results

      Why am I seeing an “IMAP server” error me…

      Apple Support Community

      https://discussions.apple.com › thread

      May 11, 2021 — My iPhone has been displaying the error message "The IMAP server "imap.gmail.com is not responding. Check your network connection and that ...

       

    • WiderMouthOpen's avatar
      WiderMouthOpen
      Esteemed Contributor

      I don't want to get into a finger pointing game but one way to test this is by trying another email provider like Gmail. If that does it too, it's a apple issue. If not, it could partly be a Cox issue. Either way I predict it will go away when Cox transitions to Yahoo which I think will be sometime this month.

  • Darkatt's avatar
    Darkatt
    Honored Contributor

    This is a known bug in the apple email software. There are a lot of discussions on work arounds, but in all honesty, this won't get fixed, until people demand that APPLE fix it. BTW this issue has been around over a decade. 

    • bemije's avatar
      bemije
      New Contributor

      Thanks for your info. I took a look at a few of the other discussions after searching per your comment, but most of them seem to have a different IMAP problem than what I'm experiencing.  I deleted my cox email account on the iphone, I deleted the mail app, I turned off the phone, I turned it on, reinstalled the mail app and tried to set up the cox.net email account. The phone doesn't even give me an option to set up IMAP. It automatically sets it up as POP.  I can get my gmail as IMAP and used to be able to get IMAP with cox.net, but for another reason that's separate from this issue, I deleted the mail app and that's when this particular problem occurred.  When I looked at some of the other search results, I found another one of yours where you recommended, "the FIX, is to delete the email ID off of the apple software on the phone, and then Re-Add it. then it will re-write the corrupted CFG file causing the issue, and it should start working again. "  Is that different than what I did re deleting the mail app and cox email account?  Is there something else I need to delete?  thanks

      • Darkatt's avatar
        Darkatt
        Honored Contributor

        you have to install the email account manually instead of automatically. 

        incoming=imap.cox.net/port 993/ssl

        outgoing is smtp.cox.net/port 465/ssl