Accessing Imap in C# [closed]

Is there a built-in method to access an Imap server (with SSL) in C# or is there a good free library?


I've been searching for an IMAP solution for a while now, and after trying quite a few, I'm going with AE.Net.Mail.

You can download the code by going to the Code tab and click the small 'Download' icon. As the author does not provide any pre-built downloads, you must compile it yourself. (I believe you can get it through NuGet though). There is no longer a .dll in the bin/ folder.

There is no documentation, which I consider a downside, but I was able to whip this up by looking at the source code (yay for open source!) and using Intellisense. The below code connects specifically to Gmail's IMAP server:

// Connect to the IMAP server. The 'true' parameter specifies to use SSL
// which is important (for Gmail at least)
ImapClient ic = new ImapClient("imap.gmail.com", "[email protected]", "pass",
                ImapClient.AuthMethods.Login, 993, true);
// Select a mailbox. Case-insensitive
ic.SelectMailbox("INBOX");
Console.WriteLine(ic.GetMessageCount());
// Get the first *11* messages. 0 is the first message;
// and it also includes the 10th message, which is really the eleventh ;)
// MailMessage represents, well, a message in your mailbox
MailMessage[] mm = ic.GetMessages(0, 10);
foreach (MailMessage m in mm)
{
    Console.WriteLine(m.Subject);
}
// Probably wiser to use a using statement
ic.Dispose();

Make sure you checkout the Github page for the newest version and some better code examples.


In the hope that it will be useful to some, you may want to check out my go at it:

S22.Imap

While there are a couple of good and well-documented IMAP libraries for .NET available, none of them are free for personal, let alone commercial use...and I was just not all that satisfied with the mostly abandoned free alternatives I found.

S22.Imap supports IMAP IDLE notifications as well as SSL and partial message fetching. I have put some effort into producing documentation and keeping it up to date, because with the projects I found, documentation was often sparse or non-existent.

Feel free to give it a try and let me know if you run into any issues!


There is no .NET framework support for IMAP. You'll need to use some 3rd party component.

Try https://www.limilabs.com/mail, it's very affordable and easy to use, it also supports SSL:

using(Imap imap = new Imap())
{
    imap.ConnectSSL("imap.company.com");
    imap.Login("user", "password");

    imap.SelectInbox();
    List<long> uids = imap.SearchFlag(Flag.Unseen);
    foreach (long uid in uids)
    {
        string eml = imap.GetMessageByUID(uid);
        IMail message = new MailBuilder()
            .CreateFromEml(eml);

        Console.WriteLine(message.Subject);
        Console.WriteLine(message.TextDataString);
    }
    imap.Close(true);
}

Please note that this is a commercial product I've created.

You can download it here: https://www.limilabs.com/mail.