IMAP vs POP email and why you need IMAP if you’re on a smartphone

Lisa Hendrickson | July 23, 2012 | 0 Comments

With just about everyone wanting email on their smartphones and wanting it to just “work” right, IMAP is your answer. Many folks are setting up their smartphones with POP and their email doesn’t match up, meaning…they will delete an email on their phone and it’s still on the computer. Everyone wants that email GONE when they log back into their computer. That’s the point of deleting it, right? Not if you have your email set up for POP, it will stay there!

Here is an explanation of IMAP and POP

IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol): Synchronizes your email, your deleted email, your folders and sent items. So that means, if you are on one computer or your iPhone/Droid and delete emails, they are deleted on your computer as well.

POP (Post Office Protocol): Just downloads your email to your computers and smartphones and does not synchronize anything. This is a problem for those with Gmail because they are constantly having email that doesn’t make sense or is hard to manage.

Changing your email to be managed via IMAP

Gmail users: When you log into your Gmail inbox on the website, you can change your settings by going to the settings and selecting “forwarding and IMAP” and turning on IMAP. For instructions from Google, click here.

Go Daddy users: You will need to call Go Daddy and get IMAP set up on your account. Once you have it set up, they can send you instructions on how to set it up yourself. It’s easy, but make sure you have a backup of your Outlook PST first! Safety first folks. Here are some instructions I found online on how to set up IMAP for Godaddy after you have upgraded.

Others: Call your email hosting company and request their information.

For those on Outlook who need help, feel free to fill out the form below this blog to set up an appointment to get your email configured for IMAP. It’s a good idea to also get your old email backed up too, or imported into your IMAP if you are using POP, those emails will be missing when you set up IMAP.

I know this may be confusing to some, but once you are set up on IMAP…your email life is so much easier to manage and it’s a one-time set up, nothing to do after we get it done.

Oops! We could not locate your form.