How can I send an email to a google contact group on my iOS devices?

I have groups in my Google Contacts for sending emails to sets of people via the web interface on a browser.

I sync Google mail and contacts onto a couple iOS devices via Microsoft Exchange.

How can I send an email to a google group from iOS? Neither the built in mail/contact apps have any reference to my groups, and I cannot acces them via the web browser (mobile version), nor the official gmail app (which seems to be a resigned web interface).

Solution 1:

Unfortunately, there's not a way of doing it with the native iOS app. Try using the Gmail app (which I personally prefer). If not, there's this little workaround: http://red66.com/2009/07/how-to-send-group-emails-from-your-iphone/

The gist of the workaround is to make one contact for the group and add a comma separated list of emails to the singular email field for the "group contact"

This doesn't allow you to leverage arbitrary groups and does require some manual setup, but once that's done you can email limited group sizes from iOS without needing a computer.

Solution 2:

I use Google Chrome on iOS.

Go to google.com/contacts and choose "Request Desktop Site" from the top right icon (three horizontal lines).

Select your group from the left and click the empty square above the list to select all members. It will then open a new message in Gmail to all the recipients.

I've tested this on my iPad, running iOS 6

Solution 3:

Actually it is possible, I just went into my sent mail where I've emailed 34 people from my desktop, I clicked forward email, which will display all of the emails, I selected all, copied. Went to contacts on my ipad mini, created a name called grouped apples for example, clicked on email, and pasted all 34 email addresses, click done. Go to gmail app in apple os ipad, click compose, click plus sign, select name in contacts where group emails were added, and click send once email is ready. It sent. I know it did because I received 13 out of office replies. I did get a message that said invalid email, send anyway? I selected send and it sent to everyone

Solution 4:

I would suggest the app "ContactSync" to turn your Google Groups into mail groups for the ios mail.

Solution 5:

I run a list (upwards of 300 names) and have been stymied by this as well when needing to send an email on the run ("Hey--we're still playing disc today...")

My work around is to save a draft letter (from the web app) with the BCC filled in with my group members. I just leave the letter sitting in "Drafts". Then when I need to send a quick email using my iPhone, I use that draft, and change the body and subject.

drawbacks: 1) Have to remember to make a new draft next time I'm on a a desktop.
2) The names are not dynamic, so all changes to the group are not reflected in the draft BCC (additions or deletions to the group)

Hope this is resolved sooner than later!