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Set up your email on Android.
Works on any Android phone or tablet, whether you use Gmail, Samsung Email or the Outlook app. Five minutes, once.
- Incoming & outgoing
- mail.yourdomain.co.za
- IMAP port
- 993 · SSL/TLS
- SMTP port
- 465 · SSL
- Username
- Your full email address
Swap yourdomain.co.za for your own domain. Your password is the one for the mailbox, not your website login.
Which app should you use?
Any of them will work. Gmail is already on almost every Android phone and handles other mail accounts perfectly well, so unless you have a reason to prefer something else, use that. Samsung phones also ship with Samsung Email, and the Outlook app is a good choice if you use Outlook on your computer and want the two to feel the same.
Have your full email address and its password ready. That password belongs to the mailbox — it is not your website login and not your Google account. If you do not have it, ask us and we will reset it.
Everywhere you see mail.yourdomain.co.za, put your own domain in its place. If your address is [email protected], your server is mail.acme.co.za. This one substitution causes more failed setups than everything else combined.
Adding the account
1. Open Gmail
Tap your profile picture in the top right, then Add another account. From the list, choose Other.
2. Your address
Type your full email address. Tap Manual setup rather than Next — letting it guess usually fails.
3. Choose Personal (IMAP)
Pick Personal (IMAP), not POP3 or Exchange. Then enter your mailbox password and tap Next.
4. Incoming server
Username is your full email address. Server is mail.yourdomain.co.za. Port 993, security SSL/TLS.
5. Outgoing server
Server is the same mail.yourdomain.co.za, port 465, security SSL. Leave Require sign-in ticked and check the username is your full address.
6. Finish
Choose how often it checks for mail, tap Next, and give the account a name. Your inbox starts filling straight away.
Using Samsung Email or the Outlook app instead? The wording differs but the sequence does not. Add an account, choose Other or IMAP when asked what kind it is, then enter the same four server details above. If an app offers to configure it automatically, let it try — and fall back to manual setup with these settings when it cannot.
The things that usually go wrong.
Check the server address for a typo first, then the security setting. It must be SSL/TLS, not "none" and not STARTTLS, and the port has to match the one above. If the address and port are right and it still fails, try again on mobile data instead of Wi-Fi — some office and guest networks block mail ports outright.
The username must be the whole email address, not just the bit before the @. Watch for the keyboard auto-capitalising the first letter, which Android does by default and mail servers do not forgive. If you are certain the password is right, ask us to reset it rather than trying repeatedly — too many failed attempts can trigger a temporary block.
The outgoing server needs its own login and it is easy to leave blank. Open the account settings, find the outgoing or SMTP section, make sure Require sign-in is on, and that the username there is your full email address with the mailbox password.
That is normal at first. Most Android mail apps only pull the last few weeks to save data, then fetch more as you scroll. If you want everything available offline, look for a Sync or Days of mail to sync setting in the account options and increase it.
Yes, as many devices as you like. These settings use IMAP, which keeps everything in step — read something on the laptop and it shows as read on the phone.
Send us a message and we will sort it.
Tell us which app you are using and what the error says. We answer within one business day, and setting up a mailbox we host is not something we charge for.