I love GIFs and memes almost as much as Costco Pizza. And when I want to share a bunch of these awesome memes or Gifs with a group of my friends, I opt for the Mail app on my iPhone. With the constant issues of sending GIFs via iMessages or Messages, using the native Mail client has become my go-to.
But when I want to send multiple images, there is the annoying file limit that forces me to either send multiple emails, zip the files, or cut some of the weaker contenders out of the picture. But on iOS devices running iOS 9.2 or later, you can use the new Mail Drop feature to upload large files for easier device-to-device sharing.
How to email large files using Mail Drop on your iPhone or iPad
When I say large files, I mean really really big files. The Mail Drop limit is 5GB. According to Apple’s “With Mail Drop, you can send attachments up to 5 GB in size. You can send these attachments right from Mail on your Mac, the Mail app on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, and from iCloud.com on your Mac or PC. All files types are supported and attachments don’t count against your iCloud storage.”
This is great for people that are sending movies or batches of songs to friends via email. Since the limit for Mail is usually around 20 – 25MB, Mail Drop expands the usefulness of email attachments by an incredible amount. Instead of having to upload attachments to a cloud storage service like DropBox or Google Drive, you can send the large attachment using Mail Drop and the recipient will have 30 days to download it themselves. Mail Drop also doesn’t eat into your iCloud Storage limit.
Mail Drop works on any iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch running iOS 9.2 or later and Mac OS X running Yosemite or later.
The best thing about it all is, that your recipient doesn’t need to have an iPhone or a Mac. The file or files you send are stored on iCloud and do not require an iCloud account to be downloaded.
How to use Mail Drop
Step 1.
Mail Drop does not have to be enabled, but instead engages automatically whenever a file is too large to be sent normally via Mail. Simply attach a file on either your Mac or iPhone that is larger than 20MB and you will see message suggesting to use Mail Drop.
Step 2.
Tap the button that says, Use Mail Drop. The file will upload to iCloud and you can send off the email message once the attachment has downloaded.
Step 3.
The email will be sent including a link that will take the recipient to the file. The file will be available to them for 30 days on iCloud. Just tap on the file to download it on iOS.
If you open the Mail Drop email on a Mac or PC, click on the link and you’ll be taken to iCloud where your file should begin downloading automatically.
This addition to iOS 9.2 makes the Mail app a much more powerful file transferring service. And with the feature set not adding any extra settings, it makes it super easy to send out those large files with little, to no extra effort. There doesn’t seem to be a Mail Drop section on the phone, nor any type of file exceptions or adjustments but I am sure Apple will add this in the near future. Nevertheless, Mail Drop is dope, and users from all devices will reap the benefits.
Let us know what you think about Mail Drop in the comment section.
