How to Clean out Your Gmail Inbox

Have you opened your Gmail inbox, only to discover that you have gradually accumulated hundreds or even thousands of emails? Did it seem like a difficult choice: delete all your old messages and lose the record of all your important emails, or archive them all and keep a bunch of junk you never read for good reason? Luckily, Gmail has some simple but powerful tools to help you search and manage huge numbers of emails.

Method I : Clean All Read Mail

Step 1 :

Login to your Gmail account.

Step 2 :

Next, click in the Gmail search box. Type in:inbox is:read (without quotes) Then, click the blue Search Mail button. You will now see a few of the most recent emails you have actually read.

Step 3 :

Find the checkbox button for selecting messages at the top left of the results. Click it. A drop down box will appear that has the options, "Select: All, None, Read, Unread, Starred, Un-starred". Click on "All" to select all the emails that match your search. All the emails on the page will be checked and highlighted.

Step 4 :

Click the link at the top of the list that says, "Select all conversations that match this search." This will make sure you have selected even the messages that don't fit on the first page of results.

Step 5 :

Click the "Archive" button at the top of the email area. Now all of your read emails have been saved to your archive, where they can be searched but where they won't clutter up your inbox.

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Method II : Clean Unread Messages Older Than a Certain Date

Step 1 :

Decide how far back you want to check your unread emails for important messages you might have missed. This will depend on how much time you have to spend on the project, and how fast your unread email tends to accumulate. 1 to 3 months is a good rule of thumb. If the email is older than that, either it was important enough that the sender will try to reach you again, or it no longer matters. For illustration, let's choose a date of August 1st 2009.

Step 2 :

Type "in:inbox before:2012/01/01" (use whatever date you have chosen) in the search box, and click "Search". The format of the date is important. It must be in the form YYYY/MM/DD, with all 4 digits of the year listed first, then the month with two digits, and finally the date with two digits.

Step 3 :

Select all of these messages by clicking "All" then "Select all conversations that match this search", just like you did below.

Step 4 :

Take a deep breath, and click "Delete" to remove all the messages. Press "OK" on the confirmation box. All the messages will be moved to your trash.

Step 5 :

Click "Inbox" on the navigation bar next to your email list. You should now have nothing but the most recent unread messages.

• Scan through your unread mail for important messages you may have missed. Respond, archive, or delete to get them out of your inbox.
• Repeat the steps above, but type "in:inbox is:unread" (without quotes) into your Gmail search box. Select all and delete using the methods described below.

Step 6 :

All the emails you have deleted will stay in your Trash for about a month. If you think of something you might need to recover in this time, search your Trash folder by using the search term "in:trash" followed by the message you want to recover. When you find the message, click Move and select Inbox from the list. The message will be moved to your inbox.

Step 7 :

Congratulate yourself, and resolve to never let your inbox overflow again!Read your emails and respond, archive, or delete them promptly from now on or use the methods above to prevent messages from overflowing in your inbox again.

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