Outlook for iOS shows “This message has no content” with my self-hosted Maddy IMAP; same message renders fine in Spark macOS and Outlook macOS — known quirk or config issue?

Question

Outlook for iOS shows “This message has no content” with my self-hosted Maddy IMAP; same message renders fine in Spark macOS and Outlook macOS — known quirk or config issue?

su ma 0

Technical Setup

Mail server: Maddy (self-hosted)
Mailbox: xxx@sample
TLS: Let's Encrypt; IMAP/SMTP authentication working correctly
Test sender: Gmail

Symptom Details

Subject line displays correctly (e.g., "Reset Password")
Outlook for iOS shows blank body in both list view and message view
Message content appears as "This message has no content"

Client Compatibility Matrix

ClientStatusDetailsOutlook for iOS❌ FailsBody is blankSpark Desktop (macOS)✅ WorksBody displays ("You're resetting password?")Outlook for macOS✅ WorksBody displays (confirmed via recent test)## Minimal Reproduction Steps

Send email from Gmail to main PII REMOVED.com with short text/plain body (e.g., "You're resetting password?")
Message arrives and renders correctly in Spark macOS & Outlook macOS
Open the same message in Outlook for iOS → shows no content

Technical Questions

Known compatibility issues: Are there any known issues between Maddy IMAP and Outlook for iOS (literals/BODYSTRUCTURE, UIDPLUS, IDLE, BINARY, line endings, or charset handling) that cause empty bodies?
MIME format requirements: Does Outlook iOS require multipart/alternative (text+html) to show content in some cases? Has anyone observed it ignoring single-part text/plain?
Server configuration: Are there Maddy config knobs that affect IMAP body fetch or MIME normalization that should be tried?

iOS Version: 26.0.1 Outlook Version: 5.2541.0

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2 answers

Your answer

Answer 1

Dear @su ma,

Thank you for posting your question in the Microsoft Q&A forum.

Based on my understanding, this appears to be an interaction issue between Outlook for iOS's specific IMAP/MIME parsing logic and the way your Maddy server presents the message data, particularly for simple single-part text/plain emails.

Outlook for iOS is highly particular about the email's MIME format, especially when receiving messages that are strictly text/plain (plain text) only. It seems to expect or require a multipart/alternative structure (containing both a text/plain and a text/html part).

There are no official reports of specific compatibility issues between Maddy IMAP and Outlook iOS, but many users experience similar problems with other IMAP servers.

["This message has no content" on all incoming (received) e-mails on IMAP account]
(https://dori-uw-1.kuma-moon.com/en-us/answers/questions/4583025/this-message-has-no-content-on-all-incoming-(recei?page=2#

To help me confirm whether Outlook for iOS is truly rejecting single-part text/plain emails, please perform the following test:

Send a new test email, but this time, ensure it is an HTML-formatted email (by bolding a word, inserting a link, or making sure you are using a "Rich Text" format when composing).

Check: Open this new email on Outlook for iOS.

If the HTML email displays normally, it means Maddy needs to modify the email structure > need to find a way to configure Maddy to do this > If Maddy doesn't have this option, need to integrate an external filter

Please help me try this, and I will provide the next steps based on your scenario.

Looking forward to your response!

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Answer 2

su ma 0

User's image

Also No Content.

Jeanie H 7,770 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2025-10-23T03:08:41.8933333+00:00

Dear @su ma,

After reviewing the issue across multiple clients, that this is not a simple configuration problem within the Outlook iOS app. The root cause is most likely related to how your email server (Maddy) generates, stores, and returns message content via IMAP.

If the IMAP server returns a BODYSTRUCTURE or encoding that does not meet Outlook iOS expectations, the app may fail to render the message body.

For this reason, the main fix requires configuration changes on the Maddy server side. I kindly request that you contact technical support team so they can investigate your account and apply the necessary settings.

As a moderator, I do not have the tools to deep dive into your account. This is because Microsoft's data security protocols are very strict, and only technical team is equipped with the necessary tools to investigate your specific account.

Go to https://support.microsoft.com/contactus

Choose Office > Get home support

Enter Office or your issue in general in the box below "We're here to help" then click "Get Help"

Scroll down and click on Contact Support then log in to your personal Microsoft account

If any step is unclear, or you get stuck - even a little - please reply and I’ll guide you through it.
Jeanie H 7,770 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator

2025-10-24T00:17:51.1066667+00:00

Dear @su ma,

While you’re working with our technical team, if anything is unclear or becomes challenging, please reach out to me. I’ll keep an eye on your case.

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Outlook for iOS shows “This message has no content” with my self-hosted Maddy IMAP; same message renders fine in Spark macOS and Outlook macOS — known quirk or config issue?

Technical Setup

Symptom Details

Client Compatibility Matrix

Technical Questions

2 answers

Your answer