Why is an IMAP Inbox Only Displaying 10,000 Items When There are Many More Emails on the Server?

Anonymous
2022-05-04T04:23:15+00:00

I have an IMAP email account that is hosted by AOL Mail, which I download into Outlook 365. The AOL Account has emails going as far back as 2015, and until recently all of those emails were visible (and searchable) through Outlook. About 2 weeks ago, I noticed that I could no longer search for emails going back farther than 6 months ago. Those emails are still on the AOL server; I can see them if I use AOL's webmail interface (which is pretty mediocre). But they are no longer downloading into my IMAP inbox. Indeed, at the bottom of the inbox it now says I have 10,000 items. 

                                     [!\[\](https://learn-attachment.microsoft.com/api/attachments/40c12e9d-b5a2-4a30-8bc4-4503de01cbbc?platform=QnA

That's the maximum. If I delete say 100 emails, another 100 emails will download from the AOL server but the downloading will stop when I hit 10,000. (When new emails download from the account, older emails are deleted so I'm just about always at 10,000 items). The full set of emails remains on the AOL server.
In my IMAP Account Settings for this email account, I have the "Keep Mail offline" setting pushed all the way to the right at "All".
[!\\ I can't find any setting in Outlook that limits the number of emails. Nor does there appear to be any setting in the AOL account that limits 3rd party IMAP mailboxes to only 10,000 items (at least not one that I can find). New emails are downloading and syncing with the AOL server, so my connection settings appear to be correct.
Is there some kind of Registry setting that is limiting the number of items that will load into this email inbox? I used to have access to all of the emails that were on the AOL server. Is there any way to get that back? One last note. I deleted the AOL account from Inbox, rebooted and then reinstalled the AOL account. It still only downloaded 10,000 items in the IMAP inbox. Also I'm using the most recent version of Outlook 365.
Thanks for any help anyone can provide.](https://learn-attachment.microsoft.com/api/attachments/e4efa42d-54c3-4fa7-b54a-ae7d93efb421?platform=QnA)](https://learn-attachment.microsoft.com/api/attachments/40c12e9d-b5a2-4a30-8bc4-4503de01cbbc?platform=QnA)

Outlook | Windows | Classic Outlook for Windows | For business

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-05-26T15:19:40+00:00

    I've got the same issue - until a couple of weeks ago I could access all my historic emails in outlook - now it is only 10,000 in the inbox

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  2. Anonymous
    2022-05-23T22:33:16+00:00

    I’m having the exact same issue. Has there been any resolution to this? I can’t find anything on this issue anywhere else.

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  3. Anonymous
    2022-05-07T10:14:00+00:00

    Hello MichaelTabb,

    Thank you for your reply again, and for clarifying the question again, so that we can better understand the problem you are encountering.

    For the scheme that allows you to create subfolders, we recommend that you test it. If you can completely display all your emails in subfolders, the problem may be caused by server limitations, because Office itself does not The number of items in a single folder will be limited, so we hope you can try creating subfolders as a test solution, which can better help us determine the root cause of the problem.

    Looking forward to your reply again.

    Sincere greetings

    Mavis - MSFT | Microsoft Community Support Specialist

    * Beware of scammers posting fake support numbers here. »

    * Please mark and vote on this answer if it helps, as it will benefit more community members who read here.

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  4. Anonymous
    2022-05-05T12:57:54+00:00

    Mavis:

    Thanks for responding.

    In trying to figure this out, I saw the AOL Mail reference you posted. But that's an old post talking about types of AOL mailboxes, not how AOL works with 3rd party email products like Outlook. Moreover, I have checked to see if I have the "unified inbox" discussed in the excerpt. I do. I checked the setting. But it was clear in any event. I have 40,000 emails in my AOL inbox. I can see them, open them, delete them or move them around. The problem is not the type of mailbox I have on AOL.

    Archiving isn't a practical solution There are 40,000 emails in the AOL inbox. I can only display 10,000, but these are the 10,000 most recent--the ones I am most likely to use. So let's say I archived 2,000 emails. A new 2,000 would populate, and then I'd archive them, etc. It would take dozens of attempts to archive the 40,000 emails.

    Similarly sub folders are not a practical solution due to the time it would take to set them up and manage them. Even if I set up a series of Rules that would ruthlessly filter the inbox and move everything where it should go, that's only a prospective solution. Moreover, I don't want to move between a dozen or two dozen subfolders to read my new emails.

    And I shouldn't have to. Remember, until a few weeks ago, I had access to the entire IMAP mailbox. Something happened. I can't figure out what I could have done on my end in Outlook, so either (1) I did something in the program that I shouldn't have done (which is something you would think MS would be able to identify) or (2) something happened in the Registry (which you would think MS can track down) or (3) something happened in an update to Outlook 365 (which you would think MS can track down) or (4) something happened at AOL Mail, but it doesn't have any settings that configure IMAP mailboxes in 3rd party apps.

    Are there any other alternatives that I'm missing?

    (By the way, I forgot to mention in my original post that I did try to use the Repair function in MS Office 365. That didn't change anything.)

    So, please, let's go "through a series of steps to find the true cause of the problem." I'm here when you are.

    Michael

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  5. Anonymous
    2022-05-05T04:41:04+00:00

    Hello MichaelTabb,

    Welcome to the Microsoft community and enjoy the time you've spent sharing detailed information. I understand that the problem is that the AOL account is configured in Outlook, but the IMAP inbox only shows 10000 items. If my understanding is wrong, please correct me in the answer. I am pleased to offer you assistance on this issue.

    We fully understand the inconvenience caused by the problem and that the current situation can be frustrating.

    We found that AOL does have a certain limit on the number of emails in the IMAP protocol inbox, as shown in the figure below. The IMAP inbox can display up to 10,000 items.

    Image

    You can also check related information on the AOL support website.

    In view of your current situation, we suggest that you can disperse emails in multiple folders, and you can create subfolders yourself to store emails in different categories.

    In addition, you can choose to archive your emails, you can refer to the method in this link to do so.

    We need to go through a series of steps to find the true cause of the problem. If the steps above don't solve your problem, let me know and I will continue to help you with the problem.

    Sincere greetings

    Mavis - MSFT | Microsoft Community Support Specialist

    * Beware of scammers posting fake support numbers here. »

    * Please mark and vote on this answer if it helps, as it will benefit more community members who read here.

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