Connect Email to Converge: Gmail, Zoho & IMAP Setup

Converge's email channel connects an existing mailbox you already own over IMAP (to receive) and SMTP (to send). You keep your current email host — there is no domain to verify and nothing to configure at your registrar. This is not a Gmail API or OAuth integration: Converge signs in to your mailbox with a password, the way a desktop mail client does.

Before you connect, make sure you have:

• A mailbox that still accepts password sign-in over IMAP — Gmail or Google Workspace with an app password, Zoho Mail on a paid plan, or any host that supports IMAP and SMTP (for example [email protected]). Microsoft 365 mailboxes cannot be connected: Microsoft removed password sign-in for IMAP in Exchange Online. The Microsoft step below covers the workaround.
• An app password for Gmail and Google Workspace, and for any mailbox that has 2-factor authentication turned on. A normal login password does not work over IMAP once 2FA is enabled.
• Owner or Admin role in Converge. Agents can't reach the Platforms settings.
• A paid Converge plan. The email channel is disabled during the 7-day free trial. Converge is a $49/month flat rate for up to 15 agents.

No mailbox yet? Zoho Mail Lite is US$1 per user per month, billed annually — there is no monthly option on that plan (Zoho Mail pricing). Zoho's Forever Free plan will not work here: its own pricing page lists "IMAP/POP/Active Sync not included". One email account can be connected per company.

In Converge, go to SettingsPlatformsEmail and pick your mailbox provider from the Provider dropdown. The preset fills in the server details so you only enter an address and a password.

Zoho has no single correct host, which is why the table above doesn't name one. Zoho serves mailboxes from five datacentres (.com, .eu, .in, .com.au, .jp) and splits account types across two host families: personal and free-organisation accounts use imap.zoho.* and smtp.zoho.*, while paid custom-domain accounts use imappro.zoho.* and smtppro.zoho.* (Zoho Mail Help). Neither the datacentre nor the account type can be read off the address, so Converge tries the likely combinations in order and keeps the first pair that authenticates. Pick the Zoho preset rather than typing hosts by hand — Zoho warns that a client configured against the wrong datacentre stops working.

The Outlook preset is listed but Microsoft blocks it for Microsoft 365 accounts, and its SMTP host is wrong for personal Outlook.com addresses. Read the Microsoft step before using it.

If your mailbox is hosted somewhere else, choose Other (custom IMAP/SMTP) and see the custom-settings step below.

Gmail is the most common mailbox connected here, and it still works — with an app password. Google switched off plain-password access for third-party apps on March 14, 2025, when "CalDAV, CardDAV, IMAP, SMTP, and POP" stopped working with legacy passwords for all Google Accounts. App passwords are the one documented exception Google kept: "You will no longer use a password for access (with the exception of app passwords)" (Google Workspace Admin Help). That exception is the path Converge uses.

Generate the app password:

1. Turn on 2-Step Verification at myaccount.google.com/security. App passwords don't exist without it.
2. Go to myaccount.google.com/apppasswords.
3. Type a name you'll recognise later, such as Converge, then click Create.
4. Copy the 16-character code and paste it into Converge with no spaces. Google shows each one once — generate a new one if you lose it.

If the app-password page is empty or missing, Google gives three reasons: 2-Step Verification is set up for security keys only, the account is enrolled in Advanced Protection, or you're signed in to a work or school account where the option isn't offered (Google Account Help).

Changing your Google password revokes every app password, including the one Converge holds. If email stops syncing right after a password change, that's the cause — create a new app password and reconnect.

Google Workspace admins: IMAP is an admin setting. In the Admin console open AppsGoogle WorkspaceGmailEnd User AccessPOP and IMAP access, tick Enable IMAP access for all users, and leave the client option on Allow any mail client. The alternative, "Restrict which mail clients users can use (OAuth mail clients only)", blocks app-password clients like Converge. Changes can take up to 24 hours (Google Workspace Help).

Personal Gmail: nothing to switch on. Since January 2025 the Enable/Disable IMAP choice has been removed from Gmail settings and IMAP is always on (Gmail Help).

A Microsoft 365 work or school mailbox cannot be connected to Converge, and no app password will fix it. Microsoft removed Basic authentication from Exchange Online for IMAP and POP, states that neither customers nor Microsoft support can re-enable it, and notes that "the deprecation of basic authentication also prevents the use of app passwords" (Microsoft Learn). Converge signs in with a password over IMAP, so the connection test fails at the incoming-server step whatever you paste.

Outgoing mail is on a separate, later clock, which is why this looks confusing from the outside: Microsoft's Exchange team says SMTP AUTH Basic authentication is unchanged until December 2026, when it becomes disabled by default for existing tenants, with a final removal date to be announced in the second half of 2027 (Exchange Team Blog). Sending isn't the blocker. Receiving is.

Personal Outlook.com and Hotmail addresses are a maybe rather than a no. Microsoft lists OAuth2 / Modern Auth as the authentication method for Outlook.com IMAP, POP and SMTP and notes that POP and IMAP access are off by default — turn them on at SettingsMailForwarding and IMAP — while still documenting app passwords for apps that can't complete a modern sign-in. If you try it, use Other (custom IMAP/SMTP) with IMAP outlook.office365.com port 993 and SMTP smtp-mail.outlook.com port 587, not the Outlook preset, whose SMTP host is the Microsoft 365 one (Microsoft Support).

The workaround that holds: keep Microsoft as your mail host and auto-forward the support address to a mailbox that still accepts app-password IMAP, then connect that mailbox to Converge. Replies leave from the connected address, so forward to an address on your own domain — [email protected] hosted at Zoho, for instance — rather than a personal Gmail, or customers will see a sender that doesn't match the address they wrote to.

In the Email address field, type the full mailbox address you want customers to reach (for example [email protected]). Incoming mail to that address becomes conversations, and your replies are sent from it.

The password field is labelled for the provider you picked:

• Gmail / Google Workspace — "App password". Paste the 16-character code from the step above, with no spaces.
• Zoho Mail — "Password". Your Zoho password works when two-factor authentication is off. With 2FA on, or on an organisation that signs in through SAML, Zoho requires an application-specific password instead. Turn IMAP on first at SettingsMail Accounts your address IMAP Access.
• Other (custom) — "IMAP password", the credential for the incoming mailbox. If your outgoing server uses a different one, a separate optional SMTP password field appears alongside the server fields.

Converge stores the credential encrypted and uses the same address as the login username for both IMAP and SMTP, which is what nearly every host expects.

Skip this step unless you picked Other (custom IMAP/SMTP). Choosing it reveals five fields:

• IMAP host — your incoming mail server, e.g. imap.yourhost.com
• IMAP port — almost always 993 (IMAP over SSL/TLS)
• SMTP host — your outgoing mail server, e.g. smtp.yourhost.com
• SMTP port — 465 for implicit TLS, or 587 for STARTTLS
• SMTP password (optional) — leave blank to reuse the password above. Fill it in only when the outgoing server has its own credential, which happens when a mailbox is paired with a separate SMTP relay.

Your provider's help centre lists these values under a heading like "IMAP settings" or "email client setup". Use the SSL/TLS ports (993 and 465 or 587), not the plain-text ports (143 or 25): Converge opens the IMAP connection with TLS required, so a plain-text port fails the test rather than falling back.

Zoho customers should use the Zoho preset instead of these fields — the host depends on your datacentre and account type, and the preset resolves both for you.

Click Test & Connect. Converge signs in to the IMAP server first, then the SMTP server, and enables the channel only if both succeed. Nothing is saved until they do, and the error names the half that failed: "Could not connect to the incoming (IMAP) server" or "Could not connect to the outgoing (SMTP) server". That distinction is the fastest diagnostic available — an IMAP-only failure is usually the app password or an IMAP toggle, while an SMTP-only failure is usually the port.

Once the test passes, four behaviours are worth knowing before you send test mail:

• Your existing inbox is not imported. Converge records the mailbox's current position at the moment you connect and ingests only mail that arrives afterwards. Your history stays where it is, and the first conversation you see will be a new one.
• Converge checks for new mail every 60 seconds, so a message can take up to a minute to show up.
• Only the INBOX folder is read. Mail that a server-side rule files into another folder, or that lands in Spam, never reaches Converge.
• Replies are threaded, not new messages. Outgoing mail leaves over SMTP from the connected address with the In-Reply-To and References headers set, so the customer sees a reply under the original subject.

Confirm it works: from a personal account, send a message to the connected address. It should appear in your unified inbox within a minute, alongside every other connected channel. Reply from Converge and check that the reply lands in your test inbox under the original thread.