Apple's native 'Mail' app not showing attachments

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Level 1

8 points

Apple's native 'Mail' app not showing attachments

I am posting this since the other thread was closed and the issue didn't get fixed.

Mail is not displaying attachments on my iPhone NOR iPad. There are definitely attachments because I started using the gmail app and it shows the attachments there, but in the Mail app it says there are attachments, and I can actually download them if if long press and choose, but I don't wanna have them in my drive necessarily, just watch them on the app. It's easier and convenient, and that's what Apple is known for!

[Image Edited by Moderator to Remove Personal Information]

iPhone X

Posted on Mar 16, 2020 11:08 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Lawrence Finch

Level 10

212,534 points

Mar 16, 2020 11:32 AM in response to alvedsc

All images that you view on your phone are physically on your phone, otherwise they couldn’t be viewed. If the mail app on your phone doesn’t meet your needs then download one of the many other mail apps that are available in the app store. The built in apps tend to be rather basic, so they don’t compete with more full-featured apps in the app store. I use practically none of the built in apps (although I do use mail for iCloud and 2 MS Exchange accounts, plus the gmail app and the yahoo mail app).

That said, I have never had a problem with emails that have multiple images in them. One possibility is that the total size of the message exceeds the message size limit of your email provider (which is usually 10 MB), so all of the attachments cannot be downloaded at the same time.

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Answer 2

alvedsc Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 16, 2020 11:37 AM in response to MrHoffman

Yes, I understand the image has to be downloaded to my phone to be displayed. I also already stated that above. What I am. saying is: In practical matters, the mail app is not displaying the attachments. It is showing there are attachments (there's a clip icon on the top right) but:

It doesn't show the attachments
It doesn't allow any easy option to open them or view them (just the first image you see there)
It doesn't show how many attachments are in the email, which could potentially mean I could delete emails that have attachments that I haven't seen.

Again: I know that phone has to download the images to render them. This issue doesn't just apply to only images. Moreover, I don't want to navigate to the temporary files folder that's hidden who knows where just to see an image or a file that could just be shown directly on the mail.

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Answer 3

alvedsc Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 16, 2020 11:24 AM in response to Lawrence Finch

That image you see there is not on my phone. Maybe it is stored as a temp file to be displayed, but if that's the case then why the app doesn't show the other 3 images that are attached there? Every other mail app does that and it's pretty convenient.

The big problem here is, when I first saw that email I thought there was only one image. I almost deleted the message since the first image is totally useless, but the other ones were not. I could potentially disregard important documents and pictures because of this, and since there is no easy way to know how many attachments are in the mail either, then one would have to be wary of absolutely every email, regardless of its importance.

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Answer 4

Mar 16, 2020 11:28 AM in response to alvedsc

The images you see on a website are data files that have been downloaded to your browser from a remote web server.

As was quite correctly stated above, the images have to be on the device to be rendered.

The alternative is to stream all the content from the remote site akin to a streaming movie, and that has its issues.

And the streaming data still has to be downloaded to the device, and still has to be rendered and displayed locally.

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Answer 5

alvedsc Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 16, 2020 11:41 AM in response to Lawrence Finch

You are right. I am actually using another email app for this reason. I was just reporting the issue since many of the features in the Mail app are actually pretty good, so the app definitely deserves its place. I was hoping there was someway to configure the app so that it shows all the attachments, but anyhow, thanks for the help

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Answer 6

deena258

Level 1

8 points

Apr 14, 2020 11:22 PM in response to alvedsc

Same thing for me too. I just started using Apple maybe 6 months ago so I’m relatively new to the software and how the apps work. I’m used to gmail app on an android and everything you needed was right there in the app: but I have the same issue; it shows the paper clip but will not let me download the attached

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Answer 7

Mar 16, 2020 11:11 AM in response to alvedsc

In order to view them they must be physically on the phone.

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Answer 8

Apr 15, 2020 7:03 AM in response to deena258

You can only download attachments that can be opened with an app that is already installed on the phone. This is a security feature to prevent downloading files that might contain malware.

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Apple's native 'Mail' app not showing attachments

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