Hotmail Sign in from iPad
The advantage of using a webmail offering (online email service) like Windows Live Hotmail is that you can access your email account from anywhere an internet connection is available. On iPad, you have at least the Wi-Fi option to connect to the internet, perhaps even the extra convenience of 3G. Either way, you can use your iPad to sign in to Hotmail on the go, as you'll learn in this tutorial. Note that while we focus on Apple's iPad, these remarks also apply to other tablets (e.g., Android), or devices like Apple's own iPod touch (see our "Mobile Hotmail Sign in" tutorial, or read how you can sign in to Hotmail from iPhone Mail).
Tip: there are four ways in which you can login to Hotmail from your iPad; setup your Hotmail account in the built-in Mail app, or download a third-party application from the App Store, which we haven't tested yet. Finally, you can access your Hotmail account using the "Desktop" version or "Mobile" version of the service.
Login to your Hotmail account from an iPad web browser
Since we'll show you how to sign in to Hotmail using the Safari web browser that ships with the iPad, you don't have to install anything! So, let's get started by launching Safari:
- Type "www.hotmail.com" in the address bar, and hit Return.
- Once the page has loaded, you will be presented with a stripped down version of the standard Hotmail Sign in with which you are familiar: this is the mobile sign in form, pictured below.
- Just enter your full Hotmail email address in the "Windows Live ID" text field, and then your "Password" in the next one. Notice that Hotmail doesn't offer a "Remember me" option on this sign in page - this because the process is done automatically. Since a portable internet device like the iPad is a personal item, Windows Live assumes that only or mostly you use it, and it will place a "cookie" by default on the iPad web browser to directly bring you to your inbox without any login (contrast it with how you manually set to automatically sign in to Hotmail).
- Once you've entered your credentials, click on the "Sign in" button. Your Hotmail inbox will load, and show all emails on screen. You have successfully signed in!
- Tip: tap on any message you want to read; you can open any other email folder in your Hotmail account simply by tapping on the "More" button near the top of the page. To access other parts of your Windows Live account (like Hotmail Calendar), tap on the "Menu" button in the top right corner.
- While the mobile version of Hotmail is toned down to load faster and be more responsive on mobile devices and tablets like the iPad, it actually makes several tasks quite a bit easier and more efficient than the "standard", desktop version of Hotmail: to move or delete multiple email messages from your account, just tap on each corresponding checkbox, and then choose one of the commands at the bottom of the screen - feels quite a bit faster!
And this is all it takes to sign in to Hotmail from your iPad; and, as mentioned earlier, you will be automatically logged in to your email account simply by loading Hotmail.com from the address bar or a bookmark. Read the next tutorial to learn how to sign out from Hotmail on iPad, and other related settings.
Tip: to try using the standard Hotmail on iPad, just tap on the "PC site" link at the very bottom of the page. While it's "interesting" to see your regular Hotmail account on the iPad screen, it doesn't work quite as expected (no scrollbars in some places, for example). Switch back by tapping "Mobile site" at the bottom.
New Hotmail, MSN Hotmail, Windows Live Hotmail & Live email are all referring to the same free webmail service offered by Microsoft and Windows Live Team (works on Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Mac OS X). Microsoft Corporation, Apple, and other companies own the copyright or trademark to these and other terms mentioned.