Seeking iOS mail app that doesn't cache messages locally and doesn't refresh when in low power mode

By Moopie Curran, 27 November, 2022

Forum
iOS and iPadOS

Hi,
I'm looking for a mail app which doesn't cache messages locally like the native apple mail app does (it's almost a gb of stuff, which I think is stupid!), and also looking for a mail app which won't keep refreshing, even in low power mode, like the gmail app is doing.
I just have a gmail account, so I don't necessarily need it to work with multiple accounts, as long as I can select multiple messages, move them around, send, and reply to emails, I'm good.
Thanks,

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Comments

By Sebby on Thursday, November 24, 2022 - 07:33

If you use IMAP, Outlook doesn't operate offline. It still uses a proprietary link to Microsoft, with Microsoft communicating with your chosen server for you indirectly (supporting push through IMAP IDLE), but it doesn't support offline operation, sadly. This is basically what iOS Mail does. Only when you use the Exchange protocols are you aloud to do offline caching of everything using delta sync. I think this is rotten, as otherwise Outlook isn't too bad, but there we are.

All email apps will want to at least cache the headers. I'd love iOS mail to behave more like a desktop client, myself. I use Apple Mail right now, and it's good enough. It connects directly to the server--good for privacy. But the search, even in iOS 16, would be way better with full text search. Battery life? Nah, I have loads of that.

IMAP push is possible with Apple Mail too, but it requires you to obtain a certificate from Apple for a now-obsolete Server product and push notifications from the mail server whenever new mail arrives. If you don't run a mail server, this isn't something you need to worry about. If you do, you can find patches for Dovecot and Courier out there, and I intend to retrofit the Dovecot daemon for use with Cyrus which already has the code for the IMAP protocol extensions in it. It's used by Fastmail, which of course uses this support and supports push in Apple Mail.

What's great about Boxer? Any particular reason to prefer it over Apple Mail or Outlook? Does it support delivery status notifications? Is it good at privacy?