At work my email client is Outlook which shows emails from a Gmail account. It is set up as a POP3 account on Outlook.
I get a lot of emails for work that have to be organized in order for me to make sense of anything. In Outlook the emails are organized in subfolders. But when I view the emails in my iphone I do not see the Outlook subfolders. I just see the emails in one inbox. The only subfolders that show up are the ones that are set up in Gmail, which I do not use.
How do I solve this problem? It would be an enormous help if I could see the subfolders on my iPhone, and if the emails I sort in my iPhone would also appear sorted the same way in Outlook.
Try using ANYTHING other than a Microsoft product. They change things from version to version, so what has worked for years for people will suddenly stop working with a different version!
With that said, to get a particular version working could be a nightmare - reading instructions for one particular version may not apply to another version!
To find something else, search google.com for the terms…
To be honest, I’m not sure if any POP3 clients would work for this. POP3 protocol downloads the mail message from the servers, and then the client is free to sort them into folders in local storage. But as far as I know, there’s nothing in the POP3 protocol to say “Hey, server, put this message in that folder.” So, fundamentally, Gmail and the iphone can’t have any clue about your outlook folders when you’re using POP3.
On the other hand, I think that Outlook and Gmail have other protocols that they can both support which would make this possible.
If you want to organize mail in folders and have the folders on all your devices to all sync up, then pop3 is totally the wrong mail protocol. Once you pull the mail down to Outlook it’s gone from gmail. And whatever folders you create in Outlook are totally local to that one PC. Period.
Not knowing what other email accounts you have, what your corporate rules are for apps and for configurations, etc., it’s hard to offer a specific choice that’s guaranteed to work.
I have to say that having a desktop Windows machine with Outlook, using GMail, and having an Apple phone is probably the trifecta of mutual incompatibility. Despite me_billy above, MS is the most universally compatible of the bunch; it’s Apple and Google that keep trying to lock folks into closed ecosystems using only their stuff.
Give us some more info and maybe we can comeup with a good solution. We also need to know what version of Outlook you have.
If GMail is your one and only work email, then the path of least resistance is to use GMail’s folders, reconfigure Outlook to connect to GMail as something fancier than POP3 (ideally MAPI) and pray Apple isn’t having a snit with Google.
I think I’d disagree with this. You can configure outlook to leave POP3 mail on the server, or to only delete it when you trash it in Outlook, etcetera.
Depending on the version of Outlook it’s one of the settings buried on the second layer of [advanced…] dialog box. Not likely the OP found it and set it on purpose.
The Gmail account we use also supports Imap. Theoretically I can switch my account to Imap protocol if that would help things.
I work in a small law firm where our IT staff is basically my boss whenever he gets around to it. There aren’t any corporate rules here.
I’m using Outlook 2016 right now. I would like to keep using it because I’ve been relying on a lot of its features. If I use the Gmail subfolders, then I would have to use Gmail as a client, which I don’t want to do. I have Gmail for my personal mail, and it’s not as good as Outlook for the work I do.
I can also change my email app if necessary. I’m using the default iphone app now.
Good info. Thanks. Either way you’re pretty stuck. Those folders are only on your local PC.
IMAP does a nicer job of syncing things like deletions or sent items across devices vs. POP3 which sucketh greatly at that. But IMAP doesn’t solve your fundamental problem: you want to use offline Outlook as a/the archive for your mail, yet simultaneously want it available on your other devices organized the same way. That’s not a feature your Outlook client nor GMail support.
You absolutely can do that if you switched to MS Exchange as your email service. Then your folders live on the Exchange servers and sync to whatever devices. The default iPhone email app works fine with MS Exchange servers.
If your Outlook 2016 on your desktop is really an Office 365 subscription then you may already have the makings of using subscription MS Exchange in the cloud.
Here’s a possibly related topic:
Some IT-savvy attorneys are of the opinion a law firm cannot legally use free cloud services. Including free google docs and the free version of gmail. Because you don’t retain full enough control of the docs from cradle to grave. I’m not competent to say for sure, but its an issue worth thinking about: