Reading emails from Gmail in C#

Question

I am trying to read emails from Gmail. I have tried every API / open source project I can find, and can not get any of them working.

Does anyone have a sample of working code that will allow me to authenticate and download emails from a Gmail account?

Final working version posted below: https://stackoverflow.com/a/19570553/550198

Solution 1

Using the library from: https://github.com/pmengal/MailSystem.NET

Here is my complete code sample:

Email Repository

using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using ActiveUp.Net.Mail;

namespace GmailReadImapEmail
{
    public class MailRepository
    {
        private Imap4Client client;

        public MailRepository(string mailServer, int port, bool ssl, string login, string password)
        {
            if (ssl)
                Client.ConnectSsl(mailServer, port);
            else
                Client.Connect(mailServer, port);
            Client.Login(login, password);
        }

        public IEnumerable<Message> GetAllMails(string mailBox)
        {
            return GetMails(mailBox, "ALL").Cast<Message>();
        }

        public IEnumerable<Message> GetUnreadMails(string mailBox)
        {
            return GetMails(mailBox, "UNSEEN").Cast<Message>();
        }

        protected Imap4Client Client
        {
            get { return client ?? (client = new Imap4Client()); }
        }

        private MessageCollection GetMails(string mailBox, string searchPhrase)
        {
            Mailbox mails = Client.SelectMailbox(mailBox);
            MessageCollection messages = mails.SearchParse(searchPhrase);
            return messages;
        }
    }
}

Usage

[TestMethod]
public void ReadImap()
{
    var mailRepository = new MailRepository(
                            "imap.gmail.com",
                            993,
                            true,
                            "[email protected]",
                            "yourPassword"
                        );

    var emailList = mailRepository.GetAllMails("inbox");

    foreach (Message email in emailList)
    {
        Console.WriteLine("<p>{0}: {1}</p><p>{2}</p>", email.From, email.Subject, email.BodyHtml.Text);
        if (email.Attachments.Count > 0)
        {
            foreach (MimePart attachment in email.Attachments)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("<p>Attachment: {0} {1}</p>", attachment.ContentName, attachment.ContentType.MimeType);
            }
        }
    }
}

---

Another example, this time using MailKit

public class MailRepository : IMailRepository
{
    private readonly string mailServer, login, password;
    private readonly int port;
    private readonly bool ssl;

    public MailRepository(string mailServer, int port, bool ssl, string login, string password)
    {
        this.mailServer = mailServer;
        this.port = port;
        this.ssl = ssl;
        this.login = login;
        this.password = password;
    }

    public IEnumerable<string> GetUnreadMails()
    {
        var messages = new List<string>();

        using (var client = new ImapClient())
        {
            client.Connect(mailServer, port, ssl);

            // Note: since we don't have an OAuth2 token, disable
            // the XOAUTH2 authentication mechanism.
            client.AuthenticationMechanisms.Remove("XOAUTH2");

            client.Authenticate(login, password);

            // The Inbox folder is always available on all IMAP servers...
            var inbox = client.Inbox;
            inbox.Open(FolderAccess.ReadOnly);
            var results = inbox.Search(SearchOptions.All, SearchQuery.Not(SearchQuery.Seen));
            foreach (var uniqueId in results.UniqueIds)
            {
                var message = inbox.GetMessage(uniqueId);

                messages.Add(message.HtmlBody);

                //Mark message as read
                //inbox.AddFlags(uniqueId, MessageFlags.Seen, true);
            }

            client.Disconnect(true);
        }

        return messages;
    }

    public IEnumerable<string> GetAllMails()
    {
        var messages = new List<string>();

        using (var client = new ImapClient())
        {
            client.Connect(mailServer, port, ssl);

            // Note: since we don't have an OAuth2 token, disable
            // the XOAUTH2 authentication mechanism.
            client.AuthenticationMechanisms.Remove("XOAUTH2");

            client.Authenticate(login, password);

            // The Inbox folder is always available on all IMAP servers...
            var inbox = client.Inbox;
            inbox.Open(FolderAccess.ReadOnly);
            var results = inbox.Search(SearchOptions.All, SearchQuery.NotSeen);
            foreach (var uniqueId in results.UniqueIds)
            {
                var message = inbox.GetMessage(uniqueId);

                messages.Add(message.HtmlBody);

                //Mark message as read
                //inbox.AddFlags(uniqueId, MessageFlags.Seen, true);
            }

            client.Disconnect(true);
        }

        return messages;
    }
}

Usage

[Test]
public void GetAllEmails()
{
    var mailRepository = new MailRepository("imap.gmail.com", 993, true, "[email protected]", "YOURPASSWORDHERE");
    var allEmails = mailRepository.GetAllMails();

    foreach(var email in allEmails)
    {
        Console.WriteLine(email);
    }

    Assert.IsTrue(allEmails.ToList().Any());
}

Solution 2

You don't need any extra 3rd Party Libraries if a summary of the 20 most recent emails is sufficient for you. You can read the data from API that Gmail has provided here: https://mail.google.com/mail/feed/atom

The response in XML format can be handled by the code below:

try {
   System.Net.WebClient objClient = new System.Net.WebClient();
   string response;
   string title;
   string summary;

   //Creating a new xml document
   XmlDocument doc = new XmlDocument();

   //Logging in Gmail server to get data
   objClient.Credentials = new System.Net.NetworkCredential("Email", "Password");
   //reading data and converting to string
   response = Encoding.UTF8.GetString(
              objClient.DownloadData(@"https://mail.google.com/mail/feed/atom"));

   response = response.Replace(
        @"<feed version=""0.3"" xmlns=""http://purl.org/atom/ns#"">", @"<feed>");

   //loading into an XML so we can get information easily
   doc.LoadXml(response);

   //nr of emails
   var nr = doc.SelectSingleNode(@"/feed/fullcount").InnerText;

   //Reading the title and the summary for every email
   foreach (XmlNode node in doc.SelectNodes(@"/feed/entry")) {
      title = node.SelectSingleNode("title").InnerText;
      summary = node.SelectSingleNode("summary").InnerText;
   }
} catch (Exception exe) {
   MessageBox.Show("Check your network connection");
}

Solution 3

Have you tried POP3 Email Client with full MIME Support ?

If you don't it's a very good example for you. As an alternativ;

OpenPop.NET

.NET class library in C# for communicating with POP3 servers. Easy to use but yet powerful. Includes a robust MIME parser backed by several hundred test cases. For more information, visit our project homepage.

Lumisoft

Comments

[Seany84]

Thanks, somehow I managed to try every C# non-working POP3 email client :) thanks

[Seany84]

I have no budget to pay for this as there are open-source and free alternatives available.

[Eric]

The only problem with this approach, and it's important to many people, is that you can't get the full text of the message body via the ATOM route.

[E-Riddie]

There is another method of getting the route of ATOM with XML. You just have to create a namespace for XML form and you can access it easily! Read about that and you will understand because its no difference from this! :)

[Kiquenet]

any free version, not premium? Any open source alternative ?

[newman]

Just tried your code, it compiles okay. But when I try to run, it got stuck for more than 5 minutes at the line mails.SearchParse(searchPhrase) via call GetUnreadMails. I only have 53 unread emails in my inbox. Any explanation?

[Seany84]

I have not used this code since around the time of the OP. However, I fired up my unit test and it did retrieve my unreal emails (count=12). Test took approximately 66 seconds to run.

[Gurpreet Singh]

I have build the console application in c# using above code, everything fixed but gmail not allowing to login. Here is my error message:- ** failed : * NO [WEBALERT accounts.google.com/signin/… Web login required. 161116082452398 NO [ALERT] Please log in via your web browser: support.google.com/mail/accounts/answer/78754 (Failure)**

[Kjensen]

In order for this to work, you need to enable "Less secure apps" with your gmail account, if that is an option for you. I did that, and now the code works. Read more here: google.com/settings/security/lesssecureapps

[Nulle]

Then please illustrate how you would retrieve the message body.

[Nulle]

I have copy pasted your code. Exception thrown: 'System.IndexOutOfRangeException' in ActiveUp.Net.Imap4.dll when it tries get mail via GetAllMails("inbox");

[Nulle]

what is ? IMailRepository. Mailkit does not have that Interface.

[Seany84]

@Nulle This was from my code base. You can remove that interface for your own use-case.

[Bengi Besçeli]

nr is undefined

[Toolkit]

can I limit GetAllMails by date?

[Seany84]

@Toolkit Yes, it is definitely possible. You should really post a different question on this site though.

[Mr. B]

Love your answer - Does every single thing need a NuGet package to be viable these days. Is that what we've become :(

[MohaMad]

@Seany84 thanks for your nice sample codes. I tried to use MailSystem.NET , but has error on Client.Log() : BAD Too many arguments provided . My password contains spaces and this login fails!

[Yijun Yuan]

I got a 401 Unauthorized error. How should I fix that?

[Albert Arul prakash]

another problem with this model is that, you cannot get entire mailbox information. max 20 email details. No more than that.

[Ashok kumar Ganesan]

When I try to read the UnreadEmail I get the exception on GetMail method with exception like index out of exception