Gmail Filters and Labels: Sort Your Inbox Automatically

Labels decide where an email lives in Gmail; filters put it there automatically. Set them up once and your inbox sorts itself. Every step below is from Google’s own help pages and is done in Gmail on a computer.

Labels aren’t folders

Google is explicit that labels are different from folders. Three things follow from that:

• One email can sit under more than one label — a receipt can be under both “Bills” and “2026”.
• Labels are private. Only you can see them; people you email don’t receive your labels.
• Deleting an email removes it from every label and from your inbox — not just from the label you were looking at.

Create a label

1. On the left, next to Labels, click Create new label.
2. Enter a name and click Create.

To make a sub-label, tick Nest label under while creating it and choose the parent label. You can create up to 5,000 labels.

Label an email

• From the inbox: select the email, click Labels at the top, and choose a label.
• While writing: in the new message, open More options → Label.
• Move it to a different label: select it, click Labels, untick the current label and tick the new one.

With conversation view on, a label you add applies only to the messages already in that conversation, not to replies that arrive later. To label future emails automatically, use a filter.

Rename, colour, hide or delete a label

• Edit or delete: point to the label on the left, click More, then edit it or choose Remove label.
• Colour: point to the label → More → Label color, then pick a colour or Add custom color. Google allows up to 100 custom colours; if a new one won’t save, use a standard colour or reuse an existing custom one.
• Show or hide: Settings → See all settings → Labels tab → Show or Hide next to each label.

Create a filter

1. In the search box at the top, click Show search options.
2. Enter your criteria — sender, subject, words, size and so on. To check them, click Search and look at what comes back.
3. At the bottom of the search window, click Create filter.
4. Choose what the filter should do, then click Create filter.

Filters can send mail to a label, archive it, delete it, star it, or forward it automatically.

Quicker: tick the box next to an email, click More → Filter messages like these, adjust the criteria and create the filter.

Precise searches: the Gmail Search Builder writes Gmail’s search operators for you — build the search, run it in Gmail to check the results, then turn it into a filter.

Filters worth setting up

Forward only some emails

Gmail’s automatic forwarding sends all new mail except spam. To forward only certain emails, Google’s route is:

1. Add the destination first: Settings → See all settings → Forwarding and POP/IMAP → Add a forwarding address. Gmail emails a verification link to that address; click it from the other account.
2. Leave automatic forwarding off.
3. Create a filter with your criteria and choose Forward it with that address. For several destinations, make one filter per address.

A forwarding filter affects only new messages, not ones already in your mailbox. Gmail shows a forwarding notice for the first week after you set one up. If you see a forwarding notice you didn’t set up, Google says to change your password immediately and turn the forwarding off — then work through Gmail account security.

Edit, delete, export or import filters

• Edit or delete: Settings → See all settings → Filters and Blocked Addresses. Find the filter and click Edit or Delete. After editing, click Continue, then Update filter.
• Export: on the same page, tick the filters and click Export at the bottom. You get an .xml file you can open in a text editor — a backup, or a way to copy filters to another Gmail account.
• Import: click Import filters at the bottom, choose the file and open it, then click Create filters.

One behaviour to know: when someone replies to a filtered email, the reply is filtered only if it also matches the filter’s criteria.

More time-savers: Gmail tips and tricks. Running out of space? Gmail storage full.