Key Takeaways

• Gmail filters allow you to organize and manage your inbox by adding labels, marking emails as read, or deleting emails.
• Create filters from the Search bar, an email, or the Settings menu to apply criteria and automated actions to incoming mail.
• Edit or delete filters in the Filters and Blocked Addresses section of Gmail’s settings to keep your inbox organized and tidy.

Gmail filters are exactly what the name implies. They help you keep your mail inbox organized and decluttered by redirecting emails automatically. Here’s how to create, customize, and manage filters in Gmail.

How to Create Filters in Gmail

To create Gmail filters, you’ll need to use a computer. As of now, it’s not possible to create filters via the Gmail mobile app (iOS or Android).

There are several ways to create a filter in Gmail, but the easiest way is to use the Search bar. Navigate to the top of your inbox and select the slider icon labeled “Show search options”.

Additionally, you can create a filter directly from an email in your inbox. To create a filter from a received email:

1. Open an email that matches your criteria.
2. Click on the More option next to the sender’s information.
3. Select Filter messages like this from the list of options that come up.

   

4. The “Search options” window should appear, with the From criteria already filled in. This option works best if you get several emails from the same address.

   

5. After applying your desired filter criteria in the search options window, select Create filter next to the Search button.
6. You should be presented with a list of potential automated actions to be performed when you get an email that meets the defined criteria.

   

This list should include the option to archive an email, mark it as read, star it, delete it, always or never mark it as important, and apply a label or category to it. You can also choose to apply the filter to existing conversations in your inbox that match the same criteria.

To learn more about how to set the criteria for your filters, take a look at Google Workspace’s article on the subject.

Examples of Useful Gmail Filters

We’ll take a look at some practical examples of Gmail filters that can significantly improve your email management.

1. Filter Emails Based on Keywords in Gmail

To block all emails containing the word “investment” from a particular sender, you can follow the steps described below:

1. Open the Search Options window.
2. Enter the email address of the sender (or omit this step to block all senders).
3. Type the word “investment” in the Has the words box.
4. If you want to filter emails based on multiple terms, use the “OR” operator to separate them; Gmail will then search for emails containing at least one of the specified terms. For emails that must include all terms, you can join the words with spaces or use “AND”.

   

5. You can click Search to find all current emails that match the selected criteria.
6. Once you are done, click on Create filter and tick the box next to Delete it to send all emails that match the criteria to Trash. (You can choose to archive them instead by selecting Skip the inbox).

   

7. Select Create filter again.
8. You should see a message that your filter has created. All emails that contain the entered words will now be deleted as soon as they’re delivered.

2. Sort Your Gmail Inbox Using Plus Addressing Filters

Plus addressing is a feature that allows you to append characters to your email address and still get the messages delivered to your inbox. This can be used to create disposable email addresses for quick sign-ups and to organize emails from different senders.

To use plus addressing, simply add a plus (+) sign to your email address before the @ symbol. For example, [email protected] would become [email protected].

You can use this new address to sign up for a newsletter and then create a filter to automatically apply a label to the emails sent from that newsletter. Another advantage of this feature is that if you start getting spam emails, you can easily tell which company has sold out your email address.

To use plus addressing to filter emails, follow the steps listed below:

1. Open the Search Options window.
2. Insert your criteria into the Has the words box: {to:[email protected] deliveredto:[email protected]}. Be sure to replace “makeuseof+tech” with your custom email address.
3. Curly brackets can be used instead of the OR operator, and they serve the same function here. There are other advanced search operators you can use in your Gmail searches and filters, and they can be found listed on Gmail Help.

   

4. Click on Create Filter and select Apply the label.

   

5. You can choose an appropriate label from the drop-down box. If you don’t have any labels that fit, you can create a new one.
6. When you’re done, click on Create Filter again.

3. Filter Emails Based on Subject or Sender in Gmail

You might want to set up a Gmail filter to categorize all emails related to a specific subject or from a designated sender into a single label. However, Gmail combines criteria in the Search Options window using an AND operator, rather than an OR operator. So, this results in a filter that selects emails meeting all specified criteria, rather than finding emails that fulfill any single criterion.

While you could create separate filters for each criterion, it is much easier to use the “Has the words” box. To create a filter to organize all work-related emails under the label “Work”, you’d follow a process similar to the one described below:

1. Open the Search Options window.
2. Type in the sender preceded by the from: operator. You can specify multiple senders by using curly brackets or the OR operator.
3. You can specify a keyword to look for in the subject line using the subject: operator.
4. If you want the filter to look for certain words throughout the email (not necessarily in the subject line alone), type them in after specifying the sender. Be sure to join multiple keywords with the OR operator.

   

5. In the next window, choose the label to apply to emails that match the criteria. I’ve chosen the label “Work”.

   

Be sure to check out our list of smart Gmail filters to deal with email overload for more examples of useful Gmail filters.

How to Edit and Delete Gmail Filters

If you no longer need certain filters or want to edit them to include certain criteria, here’s how to edit and delete your Gmail filters:

1. Select the cog icon and click See all settings.
2. Click on Filters and Blocked Addresses.

   

3. Select edit or delete next to the filter you want. When editing, change the filter criteria you want to and select Continue > Update filter.
4. If you want to remove multiple filters, click the checkbox next to each one and choose Delete at the bottom when you are done.

Filters can simplify the process of managing your emails and keeping your inbox tidy. But filters are not the only way to keep your inbox organized. You can also learn how to sort your Gmail inbox by sender, subject, and label.