BIMI in Apple Mail
Why your BIMI logo may not be showing in Apple Mail and what you can do.
Apple Mail has supported BIMI for quite a while, since macOS Ventura 13, iOS 16, and iPadOS 16. In this guide we'll go through some of the nuances with Apple Mail, explain why your logo may still not be showing when it does in other email clients, and a work around you can do to get ensure coverage.
If you aren't as interesting in the reasons, you can skip to the work around section below.
Why logos may not show in the Apple Mail app
If you have successfully implemented BIMI, you may come across instances where your logo shows for some people using Apple Mail, while for some it doesn't. This can be confusing at first but the reason comes down to the underlying email provider. In other words, some people use the Apple Mail app on their Apple device to manage their Gmail account, while others use the Apple Mail app for their their iCloud email account.
It's the same email app on a device but in one case Gmail is underlying email provider and in the other (iCloud) Apple is the underlying email provider.
The pattern you'll eventually notice is that people using the Apple Mail app to manage their non iCloud email (e.g. Gmail, Yahoo) will not be able to see your logo in Apple Mail on their device even if they can see it in their web based Gmail account. On the flip side, people with iCloud email accounts will be able to see your logo in both their web based iCloud email and Apple Mail app.
BIMI headers
The reason for this discrepency is because Apple Mail expects the email provider to add the required BIMI email headers vouching for the checks and passing those headers down to the Apple Mail app.
If you don't know what email "headers" are, you can think of it like extra metadata about the email that isn't typically shown as part of an email you receive. If you have a Gmail account, you can see what the email headers look like by clicking the three dots on an email and clicking the "Show original" menu item.
Passed down BIMI headers should look something like:
Authentication-Results: mx.google.com;
dkim=pass [email protected] ...;
spf=pass ...;
dmarc=pass (p=REJECT ...) header.from=example.com;
bimi=pass header.d=example.com header.selector=default
policy.authority=pass policy.authority-uri=https://example.com/bimi/vmc.pem.
BIMI-Location: v=BIMI1;
l=https://example.com/bimi/logo.svg;
a=https://example.com/bimi/vmc.pem
BIMI-Indicator: H4sIAAAAAAAAA+1YW2/bNhR+769w...However, not all email providers pass those BIMI headers down with their emails and thus any providers that don't do this, those logos will not show in Apple Mail apps. The two most prominent email providers that don't pass them down but support BIMI are:
- Gmail
- Yahoo
There are a few email service providers that do pass them down:
- Fastmail
- La Poste
- iCloud
Unfortunately, there's nothing you can do to have email providers pass those headers down to be consumed by an email client like Apple Mail. But there are things you can do to try and get a little more coverage in Apple Mail clients.
Work around: Apple Business Connect
Apple Business is a way to register your business with Apple which includes many features catered towards businesses, one of which is Branded Mail. Branded mail is bit like Apple's own internal BIMI system, but it only lives within the Apple ecosystem. It allows you to register your brand and logo with Apple who will then use it in emails from your domain.
While Branded Mail does not have some of the requirements of BIMI, you do need to have your business verified by Apple in order for it to work. You'll also do some DNS work to confirm you have control of a domain so Apple can connect an email received by a particular domain with the logo they have registered in Apple Business.
Having your business verified by Apple can take a few weeks so you'll need to be patient through the process.
By implementing Apple Branded Mail, you can ensure full coverage of your logo in all emails sent within the Apple ecosystem. Both from receipients who use iCloud with Apple Mail who will see your BIMI logo and for recipients who are using Apple Mail as a client to manage their other email service like Gmail.
Helpful Apple Business links
Apple Business Intro to Branded Mail Setup Branded Mail Logo requirements