Emails disappearing from Mac Mail

2

I'm experiencing a strange problem with Mail on my Mac (Yosemite 10.10.4). I have it configured to use my Google account for mail, and it had been working fine for well over a year. But what happened was that my emails kinda just disappeared before my eyes.

I tried removing my Google account and re-adding it. All my emails downloaded and were visible, but then they disappeared again - all apart from two or three recent ones (but they're not consecutive so I'm at a loss as to why those ones remained). I also tried rebuilding the mailbox, but the same thing happened.

But it gets weirder. If I enter a search query then suddenly I can see all matching emails! But then when I clear the query it goes back to showing only a few emails.

Anyone got any ideas what might cause this and how to rectify?

me--

Posted 2015-09-03T02:33:50.857

Reputation: 235

Please edit your question to clearly indicate which version of Mac OS X you are having these issues on? The “Mail” app differs from version to version. Also, I would recommend running a cache cleaner like Onyx to see if that helps clears things up.

– JakeGould – 2015-09-03T04:29:13.423

find one of the disappearing emails and make a note of it. Then, go to the gmail web page. Does the same behavior happen there for that email? I had a similar issue with thunderbird....turns out gmail was hiding the email for some reason (but showed it in search), not thunderbird. – Russell Uhl – 2015-09-03T12:57:35.437

@Russell Uhl: everything is fine using gmail via web. In fact, that has been my workaround while Mac Mail isn't working. – me-- – 2015-09-04T00:18:14.087

@JakeGould: I ran Onyx and cleaned the application cache. Been working fine for a day now, so I think it's probably cleared the issue up. If you add an answer, I'll accept. – me-- – 2015-09-05T02:09:13.690

Answers

1

When a Mac OS X system gets screwy like this, my first instinct is to run Onyx and clean up system caches:

OnyX is a multifunction utility for OS X which you can use to verify the startup disk and the structure of its system files, to run miscellaneous tasks of cleaning and system maintenance, to configure some hidden parameters of many of Apple’s applications, and more.

The part of Onyx I use regularly in situations like this is the “Cleaning” tab.

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I basically check off pretty much everything in the “System,” “User,” “Internet” and “Logs” categories, have Onyx do it’s thing and then reboot my Mac OS X setup. In your case, you might just need to clean out the “System” and “User” caches and not worry about anything else.

And if somehow you are apprehensive about cleaning caches with Onyx, I can state confidently that I have personally been using Onyx on my own Mac OS X system since Mac OS X 10.5 and client systems as well and I have never had a negative result when running it.

JakeGould

Posted 2015-09-03T02:33:50.857

Reputation: 38 217

Asked: 2015-09-03T02:33:50.857

Viewed: 4 968 times

Active: 2017-04-15T23:07:40.400