How to select multiple emails in Gmail

If you need to select multiple emails in Gmail all at once, whether to mass-delete them, mass-archive them, or move them en-masse to a new label, keyboard shortcuts will be your new best friend. Of course, if you only have a few to select, it would be faster just clicking or tapping each one. But if you have twenty, thirty, or more, there’s a faster way to select them all.

How to select multiple emails in Gmail (Android and iOS)

If you’re on the Gmail app for either Android or iOS, selecting multiple emails comes down to only using your finger. Long-press the first email, and when a tick appears on the left, tap the other ones you want to select. You can then press the icons at the top to archive them, bin them, or hit the More menu to add a label to them.

How to select multiple (or all) emails in Gmail (desktop)

The desktop version of Gmail is where you can select larger numbers of emails using desktop shortcuts. You can either select all the ones visible on the screen or select emails based on a certain label, Gmail status, or keyword.

Start by getting the emails you want to select up on the screen. You can search in the Gmail search box by keyword, click a label on the left-hand side, or select emails based on what status they are in Gmail.

Or use a keyboard shortcut to bring up one of these Gmail statuses.

• All: keyboard shortcut *a
• None: keyboard shortcut *n
• Read: keyboard shortcut *r
• Unread: keyboard shortcut *u
• Starred: keyboard shortcut *s
• Unstarred: keyboard shortcut *t

You can also choose a label to have all emails matching that label come up.

Once you have the selected emails on the screen, you can first select them all if you wish. To do this, tick the box at the top-left,  next to Refresh. This immediately highlights everything on the page. It will then show a link asking if you want to select all the emails matching your selection. Click that to select everything.

If you have everything on the page highlighted, but you wish to deselect an email (or more), just tick the box to the left of the email you wish to deselect. It will then highlight the rest, but not the one you just chose.

Another way to highlight and select emails on the Gmail page is to click the tick box for the first email (usually the one at the very top).

Now, holding the shift key on your keyboard, click the last email on the page you want to select. Doing this will make everything in between automatically highlighted.

Whichever way you do it, once you have the selected emails ready on the screen, options will appear at the top of the email window.

• Archive, or keyboard shortcut e
• Mark as spam or keyboard shortcut !
• Delete, or keyboard shortcut #
• Mark as unread, or keyboard shortcut U
• Snooze, or keyboard shortcut b
• Add to tasks or keyboard shortcut T
• Move to, or keyboard shortcut v
• Labels or keyboard shortcut l

There’s also the More menu (the keyboard shortcut to open it is a full stop). There, you’ll find further options for your selected emails.

• Mark as important, or keyboard shortcut +
• Add star or keyboard shortcut s
• Filter messages like these, or keyboard shortcut gf
• Mute, or keyboard shortcut m
• Forward as attachment or keyboard shortcut f

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