Importing mail from another provider

Every mailbox can bring in the mail it had somewhere else. The importer connects to your old provider, copies the folders you choose with their dates and read state, and works in the background while you carry on. It only reads: nothing is moved, deleted or sent at the old provider. It is on every plan, Free included.

Moving a whole domain? Read Moving in from another host for the order to switch in so no mail is lost, then come back here for the import itself.

The steps

Open Mailboxes, choose the mailbox the mail should go into, and press Import mail from another provider. A new, empty mailbox shows the same button as a card.
Pick where the mail is today. The common providers are filled in; for anything else choose Another IMAP server.
Sign in: with Sign in with Microsoft for Outlook.com and Microsoft 365, or with the old address and an app password for the others (see your provider below). Press Test connection.
Tick the folders to bring and choose how far back to go: everything, the last 3 or 12 months, 2 years, or since a date. The screen shows how much that is next to your free storage.
Press Start. Progress shows on the mailbox page and you get an email when it ends. You can close the page; the import keeps going.

Provider by provider

Gmail and Google Workspace

Google does not accept your usual password from other services, so you make an app password: turn on 2-Step Verification in your Google account, then create one at myaccount.google.com/apppasswords and paste it into the importer. On Google Workspace your admin can switch app passwords off; if the page says they are not available, ask them.

Your archived mail comes too: Gmail keeps it in All Mail, which the importer reads last into Archive, skipping anything it already brought from the inbox or a label. A message with several labels is brought once. Starred and Important are views, not folders, and are skipped; stars travel with the messages.

Outlook.com, Hotmail and Microsoft 365

Press Sign in with Microsoft and sign in on Microsoft's page as usual, with a personal account (Outlook.com, Hotmail, Live, MSN) or a work or school account. You approve read access to your mail; FounderMail never sees your password, keeps the sign-in only while the import runs and discards it when it ends. You can remove the approval at any time from your Microsoft account. Calendar, Contacts, Tasks and Notes are not mail and are skipped.

On a work or school account, two things can stop it, and the importer says which:

Your organisation requires an admin to approve apps. The screen gives you a link to send to your IT admin; once they approve, sign in again.
IMAP is switched off for your mailbox. Your admin turns it on in the Exchange admin center, under Mailboxes, your mailbox, Email apps.

Shared mailboxes in Microsoft 365 have no sign-in of their own, so the importer cannot open them directly. Copy those with a mail client that has both accounts (see other ways to copy).

Yahoo Mail

In Yahoo's Account security settings choose Generate app password, name it FounderMail, and paste the password into the importer.

iCloud Mail

At account.apple.com, under Sign-In and Security, create an app-specific password and paste it into the importer. Sign in with your full iCloud address.

Zoho Mail

In Zoho Mail's settings turn IMAP access on. If two-factor authentication is on, create an application-specific password and use that. Accounts hosted in Europe, India or Australia use imap.zoho.eu, imap.zoho.in or imap.zoho.com.au; you can change the server in the importer.

Fastmail

In Fastmail go to Settings, Privacy & Security, Integrations, and create a new app password for Mail (IMAP). Paste it into the importer.

Any other provider

Choose Another IMAP server and enter the IMAP server, port and login your provider gives you; it is usually on their help pages as "IMAP settings" or "set up mail in Outlook". For example Rackspace is secure.emailsrvr.com, port 993. The connection is always encrypted.

What is copied

Folders: Inbox, Sent, Archive and your own folders are ticked by default and land in the matching folders here. Drafts, Junk and Trash are offered but left unticked.
Messages exactly as they were: attachments and images, the original dates, read, starred and answered state.
In the dashboard: imported mail is grouped into conversations like any other. It does not set off new-mail notifications, does not create contacts (people become contacts when they next write to you, and their old threads join them then) and is not forwarded or sent to webhooks.
Sent mail shows in Sent but does not count against your sending limits.
Left behind: messages the old provider had marked as deleted, and anything over 50 MB.

Time, storage and running it again

It takes roughly five to ten minutes per thousand messages, depending on the old provider.
Imported mail counts toward your account's pooled storage: 1 GB on Free, 15 GB on Plus, 50 GB on Pro, 250 GB on Scale. If the archive is bigger, import a shorter range. An import that runs out of room stops and says so; start it again after an upgrade.
Running an import again never makes duplicates: messages already here are skipped. That is how you catch the last messages after switching your domain.
One import at a time per mailbox, and up to three at once per account.
Imports continue through our own updates and restarts; nothing needs watching.

When something goes wrong

"The password was refused": most providers want an app password rather than your usual one; see your provider above.
"Microsoft signed you in but refused IMAP": on a work account, IMAP is switched off for the mailbox; your admin turns it on.
"Your organisation's administrator must approve": send your admin the link the screen shows.
Some messages could not be imported: the finished card says how many. Run the import again; anything already here is skipped and the rest is tried again.
Still stuck? Press Need help? in the dashboard and tell us what the screen said.