Connect an IMAP mailbox

Requirements

Your workspace needs at least a Business license
The credentials of your IMAP mailbox (server, username, password)
For a mailbox inside your company network: a configured On-premises connector through which the IMAP server is reachable

Connect an IMAP mailbox

Go to Settings, Data sources
Click “+ Data source”, then “Connect IMAP mailbox”
Give the data source a name (e.g. “My mailbox”)
Choose the connection type:
- “Server is directly reachable (without connector)” (default): for an IMAP server that is directly reachable from the internet. Then enter server and port (default: 993).
- “Use on-premises connector instead”: for a server inside your company network. Then select the matching “IMAP server (on-premises connector)”. In this case, server and port come from the connector.
Enter the username and password of the mailbox
“Encrypted connection (implicit TLS, port 993)” is enabled by default. If your server uses STARTTLS on port 143, disable this option.
“Verify TLS certificate” is enabled by default. Only disable it if your server uses a self-signed certificate.
Under “Which folders to index?”, select the folders you want. Click “Test connection & load folders” to load the folder tree. Without a selection, all folders are indexed (up to 50 folders). To exclude a subfolder of a selected folder, untick it: the parent folder then shows a dash (partially selected), the exclusion appears below the tree as “without …”, and its cross takes it back.
Optional: under “Only mails from”, set a start date. If you leave the field empty, all mails are included.
Click “Connect IMAP mailbox”. The initial indexing starts automatically.

What gets indexed?

Your emails from the selected folders (or from all folders if you do not make a selection)
For each message, the subject, sender, recipients, date, and text content are made searchable
Attachment file names are captured as well, so the AI knows which attachments belong to a mail
If a mail is filed in several folders, it is indexed once, but its filing locations stay visible

Synchronization

After the initial setup, new mails are reconciled automatically on a regular basis, typically about once an hour:

New mails are added
Deleted mails are removed from the index
Already indexed, unchanged mails are not processed again

You can also trigger the sync manually at any time: open the data source and choose “Sync now”.

Search emails in the chat

After indexing, your emails are automatically available to the AI. You do not need to do anything special, just ask questions:

“What did the supplier last write to me about the terms?”

“Summarize the email correspondence about the Nordwind project.”

“Is there a commitment on the delivery date in my mails?”

The AI searches your mails and provides answers with source references. The source reference also shows which folder the respective mail is filed in.

Privacy

Your IMAP data source is visible only to you
Other users and administrators cannot view your mail content
The credentials are stored encrypted and are used solely to reconcile your mailbox
If you want to share the data source with colleagues, you can grant them access in a targeted way (see “Manage the data source”)

Manage the data source

Detail view

Click on your IMAP data source to open the detail view:

Mail list: all indexed messages with status and date
Statistics: number of indexed, pending, and failed messages
Sync now: trigger a manual reconciliation

Change settings

The server and username are fixed and cannot be changed afterwards. For a different account, create a new data source. The folder selection and the other options, however, can be adjusted at any time. A changed folder selection triggers a re-index. Mails already read in from an excluded folder disappear from search in the process. If you leave the password field empty while editing, the stored password stays unchanged.

Your IMAP data source is personal at first, only you have access. Via “Share data source” you can grant access to selected groups and people if needed, so they can search the content in the chat as well.

Delete the data source

Open the detail view of the data source
Scroll down to the Danger zone
Click “Delete data source”

When deleting, all indexed data is removed. The original mails in your mailbox remain unchanged.

Connect an IMAP mailbox

Requirements