Derailed Thoughts

Public Service Announcement – Use the Archive Button!

December 4th, 2009

Over the last forever, I’ve noticed that most people’s Gmail Inboxes look something like this:

Can I submit that it would work better if it looked like this?

Does your Inbox have a few thousand messages in it?  Ever find yourself thinking you’ll respond to an email later, only to forget about it?  Read on for a solution to clean things up:

Gmail has two filters on the left bar with an important difference that many people don’t know–”Inbox” and “All Mail”.

The Inbox button displays mail you’re currently working with (whether read or not), and the “All Mail” section displays every email you’ve ever received.  Try clicking between them.  If you don’t use the archive button, they both look equally cluttered right now, don’t they?

Try selecting an email in your Inbox and clicking “Archive”.

Now, you’ll notice it only appears in “All Mail”, not in “Inbox”.  That’s what the “Archive” button is for.  It takes emails that you’re not still working with (a finished project, a facebook notification, etc) and hides them from your Inbox page.  The emails are not deleted and will still appear in search, in All mail, and in any folders that they belong to.

This is one of my favorite features of Gmail, and it’s one that most people aren’t using–when you’re done with an email and don’t need to worry about it anymore, archive it!  It’ll always be there if you need it, but it won’t be in your Inbox distracting you from the things you’re still working on.

And that, my friends, is my nerd tip of the day.  No need to thank me; just bask in the warm, comforting glow of your freshly organized Inbox.  And please, share this tip on Twitter or Facebook if you find it useful–I’m on a mission to de-confuse the world’s email!  Thanks!