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Deleted emails from iOS 18 show as not read in iCloud and on MacBook Pro

I often delete emails on my iPhone without opening them by swiping. Before updating to iOS 18, it was never a problem. An unread email would be deleted and then get marked as read. But ever since updating to iOS 18, when I do not read an email, and delete it, then it shows up as "unread" when I look at email in iCloud or on my MacBook Pro. It is kind of a pain because then I have to open the trash, filter by unread and mark them all as read.

iPhone 15 Pro, iOS 18

Posted on Sep 26, 2024 6:41 AM

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Posted on Oct 1, 2024 11:19 AM

To clarify. Before iOS 18, regardless of what device (iPhone, iPad, MacBook Pro), I would delete an email and it would go into the trash on all the devices. And if I deleted the email without opening it, once it was in the trash, it would show as read on all devices. All was good.


Now, on iOS 18 and MacOS Sequoia, if I delete an email on my iPhone by swiping and not opening it, it goes to the trash on all the devices like it is supposed to. What is strange though is if I go to the trash on my iPhone, all of the emails are marked as read. But if I go to the trash on my MacBook Pro, all of the emails that I deleted from the iPhone show as unread.


This is all using Apple Mail on all the devices and an iCloud email address.

19 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 1, 2024 11:19 AM in response to Scott Raymond

To clarify. Before iOS 18, regardless of what device (iPhone, iPad, MacBook Pro), I would delete an email and it would go into the trash on all the devices. And if I deleted the email without opening it, once it was in the trash, it would show as read on all devices. All was good.


Now, on iOS 18 and MacOS Sequoia, if I delete an email on my iPhone by swiping and not opening it, it goes to the trash on all the devices like it is supposed to. What is strange though is if I go to the trash on my iPhone, all of the emails are marked as read. But if I go to the trash on my MacBook Pro, all of the emails that I deleted from the iPhone show as unread.


This is all using Apple Mail on all the devices and an iCloud email address.

Oct 22, 2024 1:08 PM in response to Scott Raymond

I also have this same issue. I swipe an unread email to delete it and instead of deleting it, it hides it until you filter by unread and then it shows up.


It only seems to happen the the first email I attempt to swipe and delete. All the others seem to go away as expected. I use both Google and Live mail and it happens to both platforms.


When beta testing iOS 18, I reported this issue several times but as I can see, the issue isn’t resolved at all.


It does not matter if I’m connected to WiFi or Cellular data. The issue persists. The first email that is unread and is swiped to delete is marked as read and hidden rather than deleted and can be shown again by filtering the mailbox to show unread messages.


This is frustrating!

Nov 18, 2024 8:26 PM in response to Scott Raymond

I have somewhat good news to report. I finally had some time to contact Apple about this tonight. After a chat I got connected with a senior support person. After many tests where I shared my screen to show them what was happening, they agreed that it is an iCloud issue that has to do with ios18. They are bringing it to a senior support technician who is going to take some logs from my devices and look into it. Hopefully it will lead to a resolution.

Oct 22, 2024 1:10 AM in response to Scott Raymond

Have noticed the same thing but only on my iPad Air 5th gen. Using Inbox, swipe to Trash (not opening emails) and somehow after a few deleted (trash) emails, about every other email that I selected to trash somehow re-appears. Upgraded to IOS18 about 7 days ago, using Apple on all devices with ICloud email address, first time deleting emails on this iPad. Have not seen this on my iPhone though (XR). Hope this helps! Thanks

Nov 15, 2024 1:30 AM in response to Scott Raymond

Same here with a regular, Unix hosted mail server, neither iCloud nor g/hot-mail.


1) Checking mails on iPhone Mail > move unread to trash > empty trash

2) After still > 1 hour at work on iMac 14.7.1 checking mails and there are alle of them a) in the inbox and b) marked as unread.


If I go back to iPhone doing a reload by swiping down it looks as it should on this device. Again on iMac, restarting Mail and reloading / check new mails there is no change upcoming. This is a mess.

Oct 1, 2024 10:08 AM in response to Scott Raymond

After IOS 18 when I delete an email from my iMac it goes to the trash on both iMac and iPhone. All is good.


When I go to the iMac mail trash and delete the email., it deletes it from the iMac (good) but NOT from the iPhone trash for that IMAP account (bad!)


The reason is that when you delete trash email in IMAP many servers just 'mark' them for deletion and come along later (who knows when) and cleans them out.


The workaround with IOS 18 is to COMPACT your trash folder on your iMac. Easy to do in Postbox... I don't know about Apple Mail app.

Deleted emails from iOS 18 show as not read in iCloud and on MacBook Pro

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