Gmail IMAP Settings

IMAP keeps your mail on Gmail's servers and mirrors it to every device you connect. Read a message on your phone and it shows as read on your laptop; file it into a folder and that folder appears everywhere. That synchronisation is the whole point of IMAP, and it is why it is the right choice for almost everyone connecting Gmail to a desktop or mobile mail client.

Gmail IMAP settings

Enter these values in your mail client's incoming server section:

Your username is normally your full email address, and the password is whatever your account requires — which, as the notes below explain, is not always the password you type into the website.

Before you start

• Authentication: Choose “Sign in with Google” whenever it is available.

• App passwords: Only use an app password for older software that cannot use Google sign-in. It requires 2-Step Verification and may be unavailable on some accounts.

• IMAP access: Always enabled for personal Gmail accounts since January 2025. Google Workspace administrators may restrict it.

• Alternative SMTP port: Port 465 with SSL/TLS.

Adding the account to a mail client

Open your mail client’s account settings and choose Add account. If you see Google or “Sign in with Google”, choose it. This uses Google’s secure OAuth sign-in and is the recommended setup because the mail client never handles your Google password.

Only choose Manual, Advanced or Other when the client does not offer Google sign-in. For manual setup, use imap.gmail.com on port 993 with SSL/TLS and your complete Gmail address as the username. Older software that cannot use OAuth may require an app password instead of your normal Google Account password.

Folders and syncing

Once connected, your client will download the folder list from the server. Some clients map special folders — Sent, Drafts, Trash, Spam — automatically; others need to be told which server folder corresponds to each. Getting this wrong produces the classic symptom of sent messages appearing twice, or drafts that vanish when you switch devices. It is worth checking that mapping once, at setup, rather than wondering about it later.

Most clients also let you choose how much mail to keep locally. Synchronising everything gives you offline access and fast search at the cost of disk space; synchronising only recent messages keeps things light on a laptop with a small drive. Neither choice changes what is stored on the server.

If it will not connect

Start with authentication. Google recommends “Sign in with Google”, so update the mail client and use that option whenever possible. If the software cannot use Google sign-in, you may need an app password. App passwords require 2-Step Verification and are not available for every managed or highly protected account.

For personal Gmail accounts, IMAP is already enabled. Google removed the enable and disable control in January 2025, so a missing IMAP switch is normal—not the cause of the connection failure. Google Workspace administrators can still restrict IMAP for managed accounts.