How to fix an iPhone 11 that cannot send emails through Mail app

Email processing is made more straightforward with the latest email platforms either third-party developed or pre-installed. For as long as you’ve properly set up the email account and your device has stable internet access, sending and receiving of emails should work as intended. Nonetheless, there are many factors that can ruin the process and so many people would suddenly end up having problems sending or receiving emails on their respective devices. Tackled in this post is a relevant issue on the new Apple iPhone 11 handset. If you’ve landed into this page while searching for potential solutions, then this post may help you. Read on to find out what to do if all of a sudden, you cannot send emails through Mail on your new iPhone.

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Troubleshooting an iPhone 11 that cannot send emails through Mail app

In order to send and receive emails, your phone must have a stable internet connection. That being said, launch your browser or any internet-based applications on your device to see if they work. Also ensure that your phone is running on the latest iOS version. If it isn’t, then you might as well consider updating your iPhone first. New firmware updates released by Apple usually contain bug fixes to address existing errors and problems affecting built-in functions and stock apps including Mail. And to make sure that your email server is up and running, access your email account via webmail. You can use any browser app to do so. If you don’t have any trouble accessing your email account and processing emails via webmail, it means that the email server is available. At this point, you can try the following procedures to troubleshoot software problems on your iPhone that might have ruined the Mail app’s sending function.

First solution: Refresh your internet connection then restart your iPhone.

As mentioned earlier, internet connectivity issues are usually the main reason why online services like email doesn’t work on your phone. To clear this out, try to refresh your internet connection and then restart your iPhone. Just follow these steps:

  1. Tap Settings from your Home screen.
  2. Select Wi-Fi.
  3. Tap the Wi-Fi switch to the OFF position.

While Wi-Fi is turned off, restart or soft reset your iPhone to clear system cache and refresh built-in services. Here’s how:

  1. Simultaneously press and hold the Side and Volume Up buttons for a few seconds.
  2. Release both buttons when the Slide to Power off bar appears.
  3. Swipe or drag the bar to turn your device off.
  4. After about 30 seconds, press and hold the Side button and then release when the Apple logo appears.

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When your iPhone is finished rebooting, go back to Settings-> Wi-Fi menu and then toggle the switch to turn Wi-Fi back on.

Wait for your iPhone to re-establish Wi-Fi signal and reconnects to your Wi-Fi network. When it’s connected, open the Mail app and retry sending a sample email to your own email account to see if you can receive it or not. 

Second solution: Check and manage your Outbox.

Emails you’ve created but were not successfully sent are routed to the Outbox folder. If this is the first sending attempt you’ve made and that it failed, then most likely that email is in your Outbox. In that case, you can retry sending the email from the Outbox folder of Mail. Just follow these steps:

  1. Open the Mail app.
  2. Then on the upper-left corner of the Mail app screen, tap Mailboxes
  3. Tap Outbox to open the folder and view unsent emails. 

If you don’t see an Outbox folder, then it means your email was successfully sent and most likely, you just failed to notice the delivery notification or confirmation.

Third solution: Verify and manage your Mail settings.

Incorrect server settings, particularly the outgoing server information are also among the factors to eliminate. Even if you haven’t modified these settings, it’s still imperative to review them especially after installing new updates on your device. Some updates automatically override system settings and eventually result in some errors. To clear this out, follow these steps to verify and edit necessary settings on Mail, if needed:

  1. Tap Settings from the Home screen.
  2. Select Passwords & Accounts.
  3. Tap to select your email account.
  4. Tap your email address next to Account to view the account information including the incoming and outgoing email servers.

Review the email server settings and make sure they match with the recommended settings for your email account. You can use the Mail settings lookup tool (accessible through the apple support website) for further verification of this information.

If they don’t match, then make necessary changes to your email account server settings.

Fourth solution: Check and manage Mail app restrictions on your iPhone 11.

Another possible reason for built-in apps to fail or stop working is because they’re restricted or barred from carrying out specific tasks. This is usually the case if restrictions are enabled on your iphone 11. To fix the problem, follow these steps to check and modify restriction settings on your device:

  1. From the Home screen, tap Settings.
  2. Select Screen Time.
  3. Tap Content & Privacy Restrictions.
  4. Enter your Screen Time passcode if prompted to proceed.
  5. Tap Allowed Apps.
  6. Find the Mail app and make sure that the switch next to it is turned ON

If it isn’t, then you should toggle it to turn on. Doing so will add Mail among the allowed built-in apps and thus remove any restrictions to the app.

Fifth solution: Reset network settings to fix your iPhone 11 that cannot send emails through Mail.

Resorting to a network settings reset can also be the key to resolving the problem if network-related errors like invalid network settings are to blame. This reset deletes all your current network settings and preferences then restores the default network values. Any associated errors will also be removed in the process. It does not affect any saved information so there’s no need to back up files. Just follow these steps if you wish to give this reset a try:

  1. From the Home screen, tap on Settings.
  2. Select General.
  3. Scroll down and tap on Reset.
  4. Tap Reset Network Settings from the given options.
  5. Enter your passcode if prompted to continue.
  6. Confirm action by tapping on Reset Network Settings again

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When the reset is finished, your phone will restart on its own. As soon as it’s finished booting, re-enable Wi-Fi to set up and connect to your Wi-Fi network like the first time you did. Be sure to enter the correct Wi-Fi password to ensure successful connection.

Last resort: Delete your email account and then add it back.

It is possible that the email account you’re using has been corrupted and is no longer working. If this is the case, you will need to delete the problematic email account from your iPhone and then set it up as new. Before you delete your email account, sign into your email provider’s website on your browser app and make sure that all your emails are there. Doing so will ensure that you’d still be able to retrieve all important emails afterward. Once you have confirmed and secured all critical emails, follow these steps to delete the problematic email account from your iPhone 11:

  1. From the Home screen, tap Settings.
  2. Select Passwords & Accounts.
  3. Select the email account that you want to delete.
  4. Tap the option to Delete Account.

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You can follow the same steps to delete any other unused email accounts from your device. Doing so can help prevent any of these emails from causing conflicts with the current email in use. After successfully deleting your email account(s), restart your iPhone to set up your email account again. You can set up an email account in the Mail app automatically or manually. If you prefer automatic email account setup, simply follow these steps:

  1. From the Home screen, tap Settings.
  2. Select Passwords & Accounts.
  3. Tap the option to Add Account.
  4. Select your email provider from the list.
  5. Enter your email address and password then tap Next.
  6. Wait for the Mail app to verify your email account.
  7. After verifying account, select the information from your email account then tap Save.

If you wish to manually set up your email account, you’ll need to know the exact email settings to use. You can use the lookup tool or contact your email service provider for the correct information. Once everything is set, you can proceed with these steps:

  1. Tap Settings from the Home screen.
  2. Select Passwords & Accounts.
  3. Tap the option to Add Account.
  4. Select Other.
  5. Tap Add Mail Account then enter your name, email address, password and email account description.
  6. Tap Next to continue then wait for Mail to find the email settings and finish the email account setup. 
  7. Finally, tap Done to complete the account setup.

In the case were Mail can’t find your email settings, entering your email account settings manually is needed. Just select IMAP or POP for your new account then enter the correct information for the incoming mail server and outgoing mail server.  Then follow the rest of the onscreen commands to save the settings.

Still having trouble with your iPhone 11 that cannot send emails through the Mail app?

If none of the given solutions worked and that you still cannot send emails via Mail app on your iPhone 11, then you may escalate the problem to Apple Support or contact your email service provider for further assistance. There might be some advanced settings that need to be modified or configured for your email account and/or Mail app to work as intended.

Resorting to other reliable email platforms like Gmail, Outlook, Spike, Spark, and other non-Apple email apps can also be considered among the last resorts if none of the given procedures is able to fix the problem with your iPhone’s Mail application.

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