IU email systems

Following is an overview of the existing email systems at Indiana University. Each campus allocates email accounts slightly differently. To find out exactly which options are available at your campus, see Email at each IU campus.

On this page:

Student email

Indiana University has partnered with Microsoft and Google to offer students two options for email and other online communication services, Imail (powered by Microsoft) and Umail (powered by Google), at no cost to IU.

For more, see Imail and Umail.

Cyrus mail system

The Cyrus mail system provides straightforward email. At IU campuses hosted by UITS systems, most current students, and some faculty and staff, use Cyrus mail. For more information, see 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 basics.
You may also be able to configure an IMAP mail client, such as Thunderbird or Outlook Express, to retrieve mail from the Cyrus mail system. For more information, see Reading your Cyrus mail using a desktop email client.

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 information, see Exchange accounts.

You may access your Exchange account as follows:

If you usually read mail from a desktop computer connected to the campus network, you can use Outlook with an Exchange account to manage your mail, calendar, meeting arrangements, resource reservations, contacts, tasks, and to-do lists. See Setting up Outlook 2007 to read your IU Exchange mail or Setting up Outlook 2002 or 2003 to read your IU Exchange mail.
Note: If you use Outlook or handheld synchronization software and connect to Indiana University via an outside Internet service provider (ISP), you must establish a VPN connection before connecting to your Exchange mailbox. See At IU, using an outside ISP, why can't I connect to my Exchange account with Outlook or BlackBerry Desktop Manager?
You can read your Exchange mail using a BlackBerry wireless personal digital assistant (PDA) by subscribing to the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) Redirector service from UITS. For more information, see BlackBerry Enterprise Server Redirector accounts.
You can reach your Exchange mail from anywhere by using the Outlook Web Access (OWA) site at: https://www.exchange.iu.edu/
You can configure an IMAP client program, such as Outlook Express, Entourage, or Thunderbird, to retrieve mail from the Exchange server. For more information, see Reading your Exchange mail using a desktop email client.

Additional 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, AOL, 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; for more information, 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 information, see Registering your preferred address.

After you graduate