Unable to open Google Mail via any browser on Macbook Air I just got a help request from a frustrated friend.  She has a new Macbook Air and is unable to access Google Mail via any browser.  Specifically, here is what she reports to me:

She can access other Google Suites pages (Drive, Calendar) with no trouble.

When she goes to mail.google.com she gets the following error messages:


In Safari:  "Safari can't open this page."
In Chrome:  "This site can't be reached, server took too long to respond (err connection times out)."


She said it doesn't work in Firefox either, but I'm not sure what the error message is.

She also reports that she  doesn't have this issue on any other Apple device or on her PC.

Other interesting details:  She had the exact same problem on her old MB Pro.

If it were just one browser, I would think it's a corrupted cookie file or something.  But I don't see how that could affect multiple browsers.

Any thoughts?
I suggest to check the /etc/hosts file for any entries containing mail.google.com. This can be done by opening the Terminal and running:

cat /etc/hosts


Ignore all the lines starting with a # and look for any line containing mail.google.com. If there is one, you can follow this guide to remove the entry.