Indiana University
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IU email systems

Following is an overview of the existing email systems at Indiana University. Each campus allocates email accounts slightly differently; see Your email address at IU.

On this page:

Email for students

IU students have two options for email and other online communication services: Imail (powered by Microsoft) and Umail (powered by Google).

For more, see Imail and Umail.

Student employees, or students with a faculty or staff sponsor, may be eligible for Cyrus or Exchange email accounts. Graduate student academic appointees should see As a graduate SAA in COAS, what do I need to know about email at IU?

Email for faculty and staff

Cyrus mail system

The Cyrus mail system provides straightforward email. For more, see IU's Cyrus mail

Depending on the arrangements at your campus, you may be able to reach your mail in one or more of the following ways:

  • IU Webmail lets you read and send Cyrus mail directly from any web browser on or off campus, with no special configuration necessary. For details, see IU Webmail

  • You may also be able to configure an IMAP mail client, such as Thunderbird or Windows Live Mail, to retrieve mail from the Cyrus mail system; see Reading your Cyrus email.

Note: The options above are simply different clients with which to read your email. They are independent of your mailbox. To change between them, you do not have to set up special forwarding for your mail. Regardless of the client you use, incoming mail will be delivered to your account on the Cyrus mail system.

Integrated departmental messaging: Microsoft Exchange

If you need integrated messaging features such as a shared departmental calendar, an Exchange account may be appropriate. Exchange accounts are available for staff and faculty at all IU campuses, and for sponsored students at IU Bloomington and IUPUI. For more, see Exchange accounts

You may access your Exchange account as follows:

More options

  • Some departments offer their own mail servers for their members. Contact your department's computing support provider for details.

  • If you maintain your own Unix or Linux workstation and would like to receive your mail there, the Support Center can help with configuration information, including customized sendmail distributions.

  • You can use a non-IU mail provider, such as Hotmail, Gmail, or another third-party Internet service provider (ISP). However, if you choose this option, it is unlikely that UITS or your department will be able to provide much help if you run into problems. Also, you are still responsible for reading email sent to your IU account; see Information about official communications from the university to students

Whichever option you choose, be sure to set your preferred address so that your email will be directed to the right system. For more, see Selecting your primary email address and preferred email account

When you graduate

For information about lifelong IU email addresses available to all IU alumni, see What happens to your student computing accounts when you leave IU, graduate, transfer to another campus, or study abroad?