Google Is Removing the Ability to Import Third-Party Accounts Into Gmail.
If you’ve been using multiple email accounts through Gmail, you might want to recheck your settings this month—Google is discontinuing support for the POP3 protocol, which allows you to sync emails from third-party accounts. While other solutions exist, they don’t work quite the same way.
POP3 is an older email syncing standard for multiple accounts, allowing users to import emails from third-party accounts and manage them in one place. It’s also a less secure method of transferring emails, so Google’s deprecation isn’t entirely unexpected. However, the company hasn’t publicized this change, so it may come as a surprise to some users.
How to keep third-party Gmail accounts running smoothly
If you’re still using POP3 to receive emails from a third-party account, there are a few ways to fix it before Google discontinues support for the service:
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Forward emails from other accounts. Instead of Gmail sending emails to your third-party accounts, you can set up automatic forwarding on the other end. The setup method depends on your email provider, so check the forwarding settings in your third-party account.
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Use IMAP to check email from Gmail apps. In the Gmail app for Android and iOS, you can sign in to third-party email accounts that support IMAP connections.
The IMAP protocol works slightly differently than POP3. While POP3 imports messages into your Gmail account but preserves the original data, IMAP syncs data between your accounts. Therefore, if you use the Gmail app to check your email and delete some messages, they will disappear if you later check the original account.
Google’s support documentation states that this change will take effect “from January 2026,” without providing a more precise timeframe. At the time of writing, POP3 support is still enabled in my email accounts, so it hasn’t been disabled yet, but it’s recommended to update your email settings as soon as possible.