How To Setup Google Apps Account on iPad
I was asked by a client recently how he could get his calendar, contacts and email on his new iPad easily. He was not sure it can be done. Well, he was in luck. There is an easy way to get all three items in sync in 5 minutes or less. Once it is setup, you just have to be connected to an Internet source. My client just purchased the new 3G iPad, and within a few minutes, he had all of his information in real time. He is using the iPad as his main “mobile office.”
To get your mobile office running on your iPad, I strongly suggest using the following programs: Google Apps and Dropbox. If you are using Microsoft Outlook and want to continue using MS Outlook, you need to sign up for Google Apps Premier, which is $50 a user per year.
| Step by Step Setup
Step 1. Open Settings App |
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| Step 2. Open “Mail, Contacts and Calendars |  |
| Step 3. Create a New Account
- Under the Accounts Heading, Tap “Add Account” - Touch the first “Microsoft Exchange” logo |
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| Step 4. Fill out Account Information
Email: Google Apps email account: [email protected] Domain: leave blank Username: same as above “email” for Google Apps Account Password: Google Apps Password Description: Whatever you’d like. I suggest, “Company Email” or “Google Apps Account” Then Click “Next” |
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| Step 5. “Certificates and Verify Account”
You will receive a few pop ups to verify your account. Just tap accept, continue and/or next when prompted. Bottomline: don’t tap “cancel” |
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| Step 6. Add “Server” info
- After you tap accept, you will see the previous screen appear with a new tab called “Server” - Type in “m.google.com” and tap the blue next button |
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| Step 7. Turn ON Mail, Contacts and Calendar
- By default, the mail will be “ON” and the Contacts and Calendar will be on “OFF” mode - Turn ON the Contacts and Calendars. - If you already have contacts on you iPad, You will be prompted with a pop up screen that will ask you if you wish to keep or delete your iPad contacts. To avoid duplicates, I’d recommend making sure that your Google Contacts are up to date and you remove all iPad contacts. Google should be the default. |
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If you are not currently using Google Apps for your business or Dropbox and don’t know if that is a good move, email me with your questions.
Excellent. I tried using the Gmail alternative instead of Exchange and didn’t work. Thanks!
@Juan
Not sure I’m following you. Did my suggestions in this blog work? I’ve tried it a ton of times and it always works. When you say Gmail alternative, what do you mean?
Thanks bro.
Really helpful
Glad it helped. Thanks for stopping by and letting me know.
Great Job. Very concise and clear.
I think what the above poster meant is that instead of choosing Exchange when adding an account, he chose Gmail.
Kevin: thanks for clarifying! Now that makes sense!
I see you help businesses migrate over to Google Apps. We’ll have to keep in touch. I have a lot of clients on trying to convince to move to the cloud.
You ROCK! I’ve been trying to figure out how to add my business email to my ipad. I found this and it worked!! yay! Not one link said to ever use Microsoft Exchange! The Apple people didn’t even know how to do it. I’m bookmarking this page!!
Glad it worked. Apple would not know how to set it up. They just create and sell cool products. Thanks for stopping by and the comment. I typically post more on my facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/adavidcreation if you want to “fan” that. Have a good day.
Thanks for this, got up and running with no problem.
Mark, glad it worked successfully! Thanks for letting me know.
I am trying to help my boss with this. I followed the steps exactly, and the calendar appears with a checkmark next to it in the calendar program, but none of the events are displaying. Do you have any suggestions?
@christine
I may have to talk to you over the phone about this. I can “share my screen” and walk you through the steps that way if you’d like. I need a little more explanation to diagnose the problem. Shoot me an email: [email protected] with more specifics and/or to setup a quick call.
Hmm…I wonder… sorry if these sound like silly questions but have to ask:
1) Are you using Google Apps for Business, not Gmail? These steps above won’t work if you are using the standard gmail feature.
2) If you are using Google Apps for Business, and you are an admin, you need to make sure “Mobile Sync” is turned on. That is under the Google Domain Admin (dashboard). You’ll see an icon that says Mobile. Click on it and it will have a button that says, “enable mobile sync” or something like that. If that doesn’t work, the final thing is to make sure Google Sync is setup on the iPad and/or iPhone. I don’t that is the problem…but two things that came to mind. Otherwise…it could take a little while 10-15 mins sometimes for calendars to appear.
When I try, and I click next after the first step. it verifies and then gives me the word “Exchange” in the title bar with both next and cancel grayed out. I can only cancel.
Sync is enabled on the domain and on the ipad… If I get it I will reply – if you know what is is, please let me know.
interesting – if I wipe out my ipad and restore it from a time prior to this procedure, I get it to work to the certification step – I can look at the details in the warning and see my domain info. If I proceed, it acts exactly as it did before – just refuses.
Apparently, the connection is being refused, but I do not know why yet.
@charlie
Charlie: I’m not sure why you are having this problem. I’ve completed the same steps a bunch of times for a number of companies…in the end it always works. The only time I’ve had a problem is where there is something sort of setup… you have to completely delete the account, and redo it. It sounds like you did that. Or you at least restored the ipad. Have you tried deleting any calendars/accounts completely then starting over?
Any warning pop ups…I would not worry about either…just keep moving forward. So to clarify, MOBILE Sync is on…the Google Apps domain, right? You are also using Google Apps for business, not Google Personal, right? If all this is correct… try to completely delete the account and follow my steps. It should work. If not…that is very strange.
Thanks David!! Finally I was able to set-up my business gmail on iPAD but the issue is its not accepting my password (keep getting a message incorrect password
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Interesting. I’ve had that happen.
1. Either fully delete account on iPad and setup again
2. Or check with Google Apps to make sure password is correct and that Google Sync is turned on in Admin settings.
Let me know if that works
My company uses the calendars with google apps. I’ve got it to push through to android os but I can’t get it to work for the iPad. It tells me password is incorrect. What am I doing wrong
@Jen
Jen:
I’ve seen that happen before. If you followed the steps above carefully and still have a problem. Sometimes you need to turn off your device and then see if that solves the problem. Otherwise, another thing that has worked before is completely deleting any setting you’ve had. In other words, deleting the calendar etc. Then doing a clean setup for Google Apps. That should work just fine. Let me know.