Archive and download old gmail messages

Firstly, a hierarchy of folders takes time to set up and maintain, time that would be better spent handling your emails. Secondly, it can take quite a bit of effort to decide where an email should go—does an email from your colleague about why they might miss a project deadline go into the folder for that project?

The folder for that person? A lessons-learned folder? Lastly, it can be maddeningly hard to find emails at a later date when they could be in any one of several folders, and each folder has hundreds of emails. You just handle the mail and move it into your archive. For some people, this will be a welcome relief to the torture of a folder structure, but some other people will need to breathe into a paper bag at the very thought of losing their painstakingly designed, intricate, logical, beautiful folder structure.

Ideally, you need to find a way to move them in bulk. Click on an email in your inbox, scroll down, press the SHIFT key on your keyboard and select another email.

All emails between the first one and the second one will be selected. You can drag and drop them into your archive folder, or use the Archive button. This is in both Outlook and Apple Mail both the client applications and the mobile apps for the Archive button.

In a web interface like Gmail, you can select a page at a time by clicking the checkbox at the top of the page. Click this link to select all of the emails in your inbox.

The message bar will change to allow you to cancel the selection. The number of emails you want to archive at once is really up to you. But it will not stay empty , which is why managing your email is a process, not a goal.

So instead of focusing all your efforts on archiving or deleting every single mail in your inbox, focus on achievable targets that will reduce your email stress. Only you know what will reduce your email stress, but example targets are:.

Work out what email causes you the most stress. Handle and archive or delete those emails as a priority. Browse All iPhone Articles When ready, click Create export. Your export will then process. You will receive an email notification when it's ready. If you only included Mail in the export, it won't take too longjust wait on the page for it to finish. When it has, click Download. Open the compressed file on your computer and export it. You could also use a utility like Windows MBox Viewer.

For the detailed steps of this guide, we'll use Mozilla Thunderbird because it's free, open source, and supports MBOX files natively. It also runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux. Follow the wizard to add any email account to Thunderbird. You don't have to actually use the email account for anything; this will just ensure Thunderbird is set up properly for email. Close Thunderbird after adding an email account.

Here's how to do that. This will open File Explorer. You should see a folder in here called xxxxxxxx. Run Thunderbird again. Save it to the important file in Gmail. On Gmail the archived file is changed to important and that's why you can't find it. Not Helpful 1 Helpful 0. Press and select all emails you wish to archive. Then, press Archive. Not Helpful 22 Helpful 3. Not Helpful 0 Helpful 0. Include your email address to get a message when this question is answered.

Helpful 1 Not Helpful 0. Submit a Tip All tip submissions are carefully reviewed before being published. Related wikiHows How to. How to. Co-authors: 5. Updated: December 8, Categories: Organizing Your Email Gmail. Thanks to all authors for creating a page that has been read 62, times. But after a while, all your emails will disappear from the inbox and be safely stored in the Archive. It's the simplest step to achieve and maintain inbox zero. By using the tips and tricks outlined here, Inbox Zero is now easily attainable.

Use Gmail's powerful search bar and filter to automatically send emails to the archive, keeping your inbox clean from clutter for life. Further enhance your email experience by learning how to schedule emails or by bringing the Gmail app experience to your Mac. Learn Gmail's secrets and be as productive as you can be with your emails.

These popular email providers all offer different benefits that set them apart from Gmail and Yahoo Mail. Jowi is a writer, a career coach, and a pilot. He developed a love for anything PC ever since his father bought a desktop computer when he was 5 years old. From then on, he has been using and maximizing technology in every aspect of his life. What Is an Archive? Image Gallery 3 Images. Share Share Tweet Email. Jowi Morales Articles Published. Subscribe to our newsletter Join our newsletter for tech tips, reviews, free ebooks, and exclusive deals!

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