topic Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported. in Email

Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 10:35:01 GMT

Today I received this message from Gmail:-

Check mail from other accounts: Fetching emails from third-party accounts into your Gmail account, with POP, will no longer be supported.

See:-

https://support.google.com/mail/answer/16604719#zippy=

My gmail account is set up to check for and fetch emails sent to my plusnet mailbox.

My understanding is that the plusnet mailbox uses POP3. Does this mean email fetching from Gmail will no longer work?

If so, what are my options?

To complicate things further, I have a registered 'co.uk' domain name. Emails sent to that mailbox are forwarded to my plusnet mailbox. The change means I will no longer be able to access those emails via Gmail.

Gmail help says this:-

Options to continue accessing your emails from your other email provider:

Set up automatic forwarding (web): To have new emails automatically appear in your main Gmail inbox (like with POP fetching), set up automatic forwarding with your other email provider. Refer to your provider's documentation for instructions on how to do this.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

jab1 — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 10:34:25 GMT

Yes, it does mean Gmail will no longer collect email from third-party accounts, as it says.

What you will have to do is just accept it - Google will not change their minds.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 10:41:22 GMT

Under Plusnet 'Manage My Mail' it looks like I should be able to set up email forwarding from my Plusnet mailbox to my Gmail account using what it calls 'Redirects'.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 10:45:34 GMT

What if I change my Plusnet mailbox from POP to IMAP?

Can I do that?

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

MisterW — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 11:03:15 GMT

My understanding is that the plusnet mailbox uses POP3

@briank your Plusnet mailbox isnt defined as POP3. POP3 or IMAP is the mechanism you use to access the mailbox.

POP3 downloads the messages from the server mailbox (Inbox) , stores them locally and then deletes them from the server (it can be set to leave messages on server as well)

IMAP accesses messages in situ on the server and can access various server folders e.g Inbox , Sent, Spam etc

I assume gmail can be configured to use IMAP to access your Plusnet mailbox. However, be aware, that using IMAP access will leave the messages on the PLusnet server, and deleting them in gmail will delete them completely.

The settings for IMAP are , server imap.plus.net, port 993 , security TLS/SSL . Username & password are the same as for POP access

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

PhilipHeyes — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:09:02 GMT

Why not add the Third Party email accounts to your email client ?

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:39:55 GMT

Why not add the Third Party email accounts to your email client ?

Can you explain?

Things are already too complicated:-

When someone sends an email to my 'co.uk' domain, it gets forwarded to my plusnet mailbox.

From there it gets fetched into my Gmail mailbox. This second link in the chain will no longer work.

Ar you suggesting I add yet another email client?

As far as I can tell Gmail does not support IMAP when checking mail from other accounts.

Right now I am thinking I will have to change all the email addresses I have registered with third parties to use my Gmail address rather than the address associated with my co.uk domain. This will be a real pain!

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

PhilipHeyes — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:42:42 GMT

My goal is a simple solution that uses the email tools that are under your control.

I am suggesting add 3rd party email accounts to your existing email client.

In MS Outlook ( it could be Thunderbird etc ) I have 9 email accounts configured some are from Plusnet now Greenby and some are from 123REG domains one is an old talk21 account.

Each email address is an distinct Outlook account with its own folders ( Inbox / Sent Items / Deleted etc ).

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:43:59 GMT

I'm not sure you can do that in Gmail.

In any case I would much prefer all my emails to appear in one inbox rather than be scattered in different folders.

That would make searching a pain.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

PhilipHeyes — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:54:02 GMT

I have 3 accounts configured in the Gmail mobile app, one from Gmail & two Plusnet / Greenby accounts.

In the Gmail app on my Samsung mobile the navigation to would be :

Gmail >>> Settings >>> Add account

Using the All inboxes view shows emails from all the different accounts as a consolidated list.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 13:06:20 GMT

I am not using the Gmail mobile app. I am using Gmail from a web browser on a Windows PC.

There is no 'Add account' option under settings.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

Jones — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 13:19:46 GMT

You can add accounts in Gmail web.

It's in Settings>Accounts and Import>Check email from other accounts: Add an email account

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

PhilipHeyes — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 13:21:56 GMT

Might be time to consider a proper email client. Thunderbird is excellent with Gmail and it is free.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 13:46:41 GMT

I have been using Gmail for over 20 years and have thousands of old emails in my inbox.

I find it useful to be able to search emails that go back many years.

Gmail is configured with many custom filters to add coloured labels to incoming messages, block certain addresses etc.

Switching to a completely new email client would be a huge amount of work. It's not an option.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 13:45:46 GMT

"You can add accounts in Gmail web.

It's in Settings>Accounts and Import>Check email from other accounts: Add an email account"

-----

That only works for POP3!

ThIs is the problem I am trying to find a workaround for.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 14:25:01 GMT

I am going to try changing the forwarding address in my co.uk email configuration.

It will forward emails sent to <a>@<b>.co.uk to something like <x>_plus@<y>.plus.com

In the Plusnet email config I will add a new redirect to forward <x>_plus@<y>.plus.com to my gmail address <z>@gmail.com.

I have used <a>, <b>, <x>,<y>, <z> here in place of the real strings for security reasons but you get the general idea.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 15:58:52 GMT

Nothing seems to be working...

To simplify things, I used Plusnet Webmail directly to send an email to my Gmail mailbox rather than forwarding from my co.uk address.

I tried sending an email from Plusnet Webmail using the new address (i.e. from <x>_plus@<y>.plus.com to <z>@gmail.com).

Webmail indicated it was sent successfully but nothing arrived in my Gmail Inbox (or Spam).

At first I wondered if it takes time for the new email address to become active so then I tried using an existing plusnet address.

(i.e. from <x>@<y>.plus.com to <z>@gmail.com).

That also failed to appear in my Gmail inbox.

I am baffled!

I just tried sending an email from Microsoft Outlook to Gmail. That works as expected.

Next I tried sending email from Plusnet Webmail to my MS Outlook address.

Plusnet Webmail displayed an SMTP error 452 (Failed to add recipient): Too many recipient in last hour.

The conclusion is that Plusnet Webmail is not working.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

PhilipHeyes — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 16:08:00 GMT

Try a loop back test ... Using Plusnet Webmail try sending an email to yourself.

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 16:10:58 GMT

The email I sent from my Plusnet Webmail to Gmail using my old Plusnet email address has just arrived in my Gmail inbox.

It was sent at 15:36. It did not arrive until 16:00.

What is going on?

Re: Gmail: Fetching emails from third-party accounts with POP no longer supported.

briank — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 16:28:11 GMT

A loopback test from Plusnet Webmail using my old plusnet address works.

If I use the newly created <x>_plus@<y>.plus.com address as the destination, the email does not appear back in the Webmail inbox. That's to be expected because Plusnet is configured to forward such emails to my Gmail mailbox. Unfortunately It doesn't appear there either.