How to Set Up Email Filters in Gmail, Yahoo Mail, and Outlook

Managing your email inbox can often feel overwhelming. With work emails, promotions, and newsletters constantly pouring in, it's easy for important messages to get buried. Luckily, Gmail, Yahoo, and Outlook offer powerful filtering tools that let you stay on top of things.

How to filter emails in Gmail

Gmail offers a powerful filtering system to help you organize your inbox. You can automatically sort, label, archive, delete, or flag emails based on a variety of criteria.

To create a filter, open your Gmail inbox and click the filter icon next to the search bar at the top. This will open an advanced search box with a variety of options. Here's what they do:

1. Enter an email address in the From field to filter messages from that address. Use the * wildcard (for example, *@domain.com ) to filter all emails from a specific domain.
2. The To field works well with Gmail aliases. For example, if you signed up for LinkedIn using John+LinkedIn@gmail.com, you can easily filter messages from LinkedIn.
3. The Subject field allows you to filter messages that have specific words in the subject line.
4. Contains and Does Not contain allows you to scan emails for specific words. You can also use Gmail search operators here to search for multiple words.
5. The Size and Date drop-down menus in the range allow you to filter emails based on size or the date the email was received.
6. Use the Contains Attachments box if you only want to find emails with attachments.
7. Check Exclude message conversations  to exclude messages from your Google Chat.
8. Use the Search drop-down menu to filter from a specific existing label.

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When finished, click the Create Filter button . You can also click the Search button to test the filter and make sure it shows matching emails.

Next, you'll need to decide what happens to emails that match this filter by selecting the appropriate checkboxes. For example, you can mark them as read, archive them, forward them to another address, or apply a label. If you want the filter to also apply to existing emails, check the Also apply filter to X matching conversations option .

When you're done, click Create Filter to complete the process. You can review, edit, or delete your Gmail filters at any time.

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Tip : If creating a filter sounds too complicated or if you're not sure which filter to create, Gmail can help. Just select an existing message in your inbox, then click the three-dot menu and select Filter messages like this one . This will open a filter window with a few pre-filled fields based on the message you selected.

How to set up Yahoo Mail filters

Yahoo Mail offers some handy email filtering features that can help you manage your inbox efficiently. While it doesn't offer as many advanced options as Gmail, Yahoo's filters are still useful for keeping your inbox organized.

To set up filters in Yahoo Mail, open your inbox, click Settings , then select More settings (the 3-dot icon). Go to the Filters tab on the left and click the Add new filter option to get started and use the following options:

1. From : Filter messages from specific senders or domains.
2. To : Filter emails sent to a specific address.
3. Subject : Filter by specific keywords in the subject line.
4. Content : Filter emails that contain certain words or phrases in the text body.

For each filter category (From, To, Subject, and Content), you can choose different conditions such as Contains, Does not contain, Begins with, or Ends with , allowing you to create custom filters based on specific keywords. Additionally, Yahoo Mail allows you to match case when filtering, which is useful if you're looking for specific all-caps phrases, such as acronyms or important keywords.

Once you've completed the filter criteria as desired, you can select the folder to move the matching emails to. Then, click Save .

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Note that Yahoo applies your filters in order from top to bottom. So when reviewing your filter list, make sure your most important filter is at the top, as it will take precedence if a message matches multiple filters. You can also edit or delete existing filters from this page.

How to filter emails in Outlook

Finally, if you use Microsoft Outlook as your email client, you can filter messages using Outlook Rules. Open the Outlook app or go to Outlook.com and click the gear icon in the upper right corner. Then, go to Mail > Rules and click the Add new rule button .

Note : Because the new Outlook for Windows is similar to the web version, the following steps apply to both the desktop and web versions of Outlook.

Next, enter a name for your filter and then use the Add a condition drop-down menu to set the condition. You'll see a number of options grouped into categories. For example, one category is My name is , where you can choose options like I'm on the To line, I'm on the CC line, I'm not on the To line and so on. If you want to add more conditions, click Add another condition below the first box.

After setting up your conditions, use the Add a condition drop-down menu to specify what Outlook should do with the email. For example, you can move or copy the message to a folder, delete it, or even pin the message to keep it at the top of your inbox for easy reference. Other useful actions include marking the message as important or forwarding it to another address.

Check the Add an action checkbox if you don't want to run any more rules after this rule is executed. You can also check the Run rule now option to apply it to your existing emails. Finally, click Save to complete the process.

Your Outlook filter is now ready. You can repeat the above steps if you need to create more filters.

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And that's it! Now you know how to set up and use filters to effectively organize your inbox. Take some time to explore the filtering options offered by your email provider and customize them to suit your personal needs - your inbox will thank you!

Samuel Daniel

Update 23 December 2024