How to Get Your Accounts Back After a Reinstall or on a New Phone

You reinstalled BlueMail, or you are setting up a new phone, and the app opens empty. The good news: in almost every case nothing is lost. BlueMail is an email app, not a mail host — your messages live on your email provider's server, so re-adding an account brings your mail back down with it.

What to do next depends on one thing: does your old BlueMail install still exist?

If the old device still works and has BlueMail on it

Use MagicSync — it transfers your accounts and settings from the old install to the new one, so you don't have to rebuild your setup by hand.

1. On the old device, go to Settings | MagicSync | Start MagicSync and tap Get MagicSync number.
2. On the new device, choose I have a MagicSync number — on a fresh install the Welcome screen offers to link accounts via MagicSync; otherwise reach the same screen through Settings | MagicSync | Start MagicSync.
3. Enter the number. Your account settings transfer over.

Two things to know:

• You will type your email passwords again. For security reasons, MagicSync never carries passwords across — each account asks for its own on the new device.
• Don't worry about writing the number down. If you lose it, generate a new one on the old device at any time.

Once the devices are linked, adding or removing an account on one applies to the other automatically. The full walkthrough, including the capture of the old-device side, is in Moving BlueMail to a New Phone or Computer.

If the old install is gone

If the old phone is lost, broken, reset, or sold — or you uninstalled BlueMail and are reinstalling on the same device — MagicSync cannot generate a number, so there is no transfer. Uninstalling removes the app's local data, and there is no server-side copy of your BlueMail setup for us to restore from.

Instead, add each account again. For most accounts your email address and password are all that is needed:

1. Install BlueMail if you haven't yet — download links for every platform are in Sign in and Get Started with BlueMail.
2. Add your account with its email address and password.
3. If a provider refuses to connect, it usually wants an app password or an IMAP switch turned on first — find yours in Why Won't My Account Add? Quick Fixes, or work through Can't Add My Account.

This is less painful than it sounds, because of where your mail actually lives — read on.

Where your emails went, and how they come back

For IMAP and Exchange accounts, the server holds your messages; BlueMail is a window onto them. Reinstalling the app does not delete them. As soon as the account is added again, your mail downloads from the server, going back as far as that account's sync period allows.

• Older mail that doesn't appear is usually outside the sync window, not deleted — increase the period under Days to Sync.
• This is true whether you used MagicSync or re-added the account by hand: MagicSync moves account settings, not messages. Either way, the mail itself comes from your provider's server.
• If a specific email is missing after everything has synced, see Missing Emails and How to Recover a Deleted Email.

The POP3 exception

POP3 accounts are the one case where mail can exist only on the device. POP3 does not sync folders with the server — folders like Archive, Spam, or Trash are created locally in BlueMail — and if your account (or another mail app on the same address) is set to delete messages from the server after downloading them, the copy on the device is the only copy.

• After a reinstall, or on a new device, only what is still on the server comes back. Messages that existed only in BlueMail's local folders do not.
• BlueMail's default for POP3 is to leave messages on the server, so your Inbox mail is usually still there — see How does my POP3 Account work in BlueMail? for the Delete Messages on Server options.
• If the old device still works, that local mail is still on it — and MagicSync will not move it, since it transfers settings, not messages. On desktop (Windows, Mac, Linux) you can export folders to .mbox files there and import them on the new install — see Backup in BlueMail.

Updating the app is not a reinstall

A regular update — including a beta build — installs on top of your current version, so your existing accounts, emails, and settings remain intact. There is no need to set anything up again after updating. Only uninstalling the app removes its local data.

Still stuck?

If an account refuses to come back, start with Can't Add My Account. If it added fine but mail is missing, check Days to Sync first. For anything else, write to support@bluemail.me and mention which provider the account is with and whether it was set up as IMAP, Exchange, or POP3.