Complete Guide on How to Mass Delete Gmail (Android and iOS)

Inbox Zapper

September 5, 2024

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Over time, your Gmail inbox fills up with tons of unwanted emails. This can include newsletters from sites you no longer visit, promotional emails from stores you no longer shop at, or even old email threads from past projects you have completed. Before you know it, your inbox goes from having a few hundred emails to thousands. And as you scroll through this clutter to find an important email, you can’t help but feel overwhelmed. Not only does a cluttered inbox look bad, but it can also have real consequences. For one, it makes finding important emails a challenge. It can even impact your Gmail performance and functionality. Fortunately, with this guide on how to clean up emails in Gmail, you'll have the valuable insights to address your goals of clearing all unwanted emails and staying on top of your Gmail inbox.

One of the best ways to quickly delete a large number of unwanted emails is to use Inbox Zapper's Gmail cleanup tool. This simple tool helps you zap away emails to regain control of your inbox.

Why Delete Your Emails in Gmail?

This is a common issue when your Gmail inbox is not organized correctly. A cluttered email inbox can severely impact productivity and efficiency because it is difficult to navigate and respond. This clutter can also contribute to ’email overload’ or ’email fatigue,’ a state of being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of emails flooding your inbox in a short period.

Gmail Storage Limits and Cluttered Inboxes

Not only this, but it also brings up the Gmail storage limit issue. Gmail’s default 15 GB free plan may seem sufficient initially, but it will exhaust quickly if you don’t clean up old, unnecessary emails.

The Overwhelming Burden of Email Overload

74% of employees feel overwhelmed by their email overload. This contributes to mental stress and sometimes even leads to missing important emails. Email Fatigue Statistics survey of 1,068 adults in the United States found that 74% of people feel overwhelmed by the email overload in their inbox. Just think about it: almost half of those surveyed, 44% spend hours clearing junk messages at work.

Email Overload on Customer Engagement

For about a third of Americans, it’s like a battle zone with up to 100 emails landing in their inbox daily. These statistics paint a vivid picture of the challenges of dealing with email overload – issues that marketers must face head-on if they hope to maintain meaningful connections with their audiences.

The Growing Prevalence of Email Neglect

Recent research from the marketing and branding platform Airship showed the frequency with which US mobile users of the internet ignore or delete letters from companies without reading them. A chart named Emails Increasingly Left Unread illustrating these trends shows the harsh reality:

15% of users always ignore such emails
33% admit to doing so often
34% admit they do this about half the time
14% rarely ignore or delete these emails
5% of users report that they have never engaged in such behavior

Why You Should Delete Emails Instead of Archiving Them

Many people either archive their emails or let them accumulate in their inbox indefinitely. There are three common reasons to consign your read emails to the trash:

You’re running out of storage and need to free up space to avoid buying a paid account.
You want to secure emails containing sensitive information by removing them from existence.
It may sound drastic, but it could make sense if you’re sure you’ll never need them again.

A deleted email can’t be stolen during a hack or data breach. It’s the modern equivalent of burn after reading. In a work context, you may need to delete emails to comply with your company’s data retention policy. You’re emptying your inbox as a precursor to deleting your Gmail account to protect your privacy. If you leave messages in Gmail, Google will continue accessing your data.

How do I Know Which Emails to Delete?

Not all emails need to be deleted, and it’s essential to identify which ones are worth keeping. The question for most Gmail users is, how do I know which emails to delete? There are several approaches here, none of which are strictly right or wrong, but I’d suggest using one or more of the following dimensions to narrow down your inbox:

Date

Do you need the messages you sent back and forth in 2011? The date feature lets you quickly call up all emails sent or received before a specific date, making your inbox more contemporary.

Size

If you’re approaching your upper storage limit, one of your best bets is to filter emails based on size. You can call up all emails above a certain size, such as 3 MB, and delete them all at once or manually review them, downloading the important attachments before getting rid of them altogether.

Attachments

Similarly, you can filter emails based on whether they have attachments. Attachments tend to be the worst offenders regarding email size, and they’re easy to review without downloading them individually.

Subject lines

Sometimes, you may be able to weed out emails based on their subject line. For example, if you received many emails about a certain project, but that project is now over, you could delete every email with the project's name in the subject line.

Senders

If you have a former client with whom you’re never working again, or if there’s an employee no longer with the company, you can call up every email they sent me and delete them en masse.

Be careful here. Gmail’s parameters are precise, but there’s a chance you could be forgetting about an important email that happens to match one of the qualifications you’ve chosen. Always double-check before hitting delete for good.

Your One-Click Solution for Email Cleanup

Inbox Zapper is the Gmail cleanup tool that works. With one click, Inbox Zapper allows you to:

Mass unsubscribe from emails and newsletters, and mass delete emails.
Scan your inbox for email lists and unwanted emails.

None of your email data ever leaves your device, preserving complete privacy. Inbox Zapper was designed with privacy in mind from day one. Other tools resell your data; we just help you clean your inbox.

Join 15,687 people who have used Inbox Zapper to clean 28,384,924 emails. For now, Inbox Zero only supports Gmail, but we will expand to other email services soon. Inbox Zapper is the easiest way to clean your Gmail inbox. Try Inbox Zapper's Gmail cleanup tool for free today to clean up your Gmail inbox with one-click.

How to Delete Gmail Emails in Bulk on a Computer

Deleting emails in bulk on a computer is straightforward and can be done quickly with simple steps. Let’s say that your inbox is so neglected and overflowing with useless messages that you’re ready to apply the Gmail bulk delete features to get rid of everything in one go.

Here’s how to delete emails in Gmail Inbox:
1. Log in to your mail account.
2. Navigate to the Inbox folder.
3. At the top of the list of emails, you'll find a checkbox. When you click on it, it will select all the messages on that page.
4. Click the ‘Select all [number] messages in Inbox’ option.
5. Now that all emails in your inbox are selected, click on the Trash bin icon at the top of the email list.
6. All the messages that used to fill your inbox are now in the Trash folder. If you don't need to recover deleted emails from Gmail, go to the Trash folder and click on the 'Empty Trash now' option. Alternatively, let Gmail do the work for you, as it will automatically empty the Trash folder after 30 days.

How to Mass Delete Specific Emails on Gmail

It's easy to mass delete Gmail emails regardless of their content, age, and other criteria. But what about when you want to bulk delete specific types of emails? Here’s how to delete emails based on their category and other criteria.

1. Log in to your mail account.
2. Navigate to the Promotions category.
3. At the top-left corner of the email list, click on the checkbox to select all the emails on the page.
4. Click the ‘Select all [number] conversations in Promotions’ option.
5. Once you have selected all the messages, click the Trash bin icon to delete them.

How to Delete All Unread Messages

1. Log in to your mail account.
2. Type "is:unread" in the search bar and hit Enter.
3. Click the top checkbox.
4. Click the ‘Select all messages that match this search’ option.
5. Click the Trash bin icon to delete all unread Gmail emails that you no longer need.

How to Mass Delete Emails on Gmail by Age

Follow these steps to delete old emails in Gmail:
1. Log in to your inbox.
2. Type "before:YYYY/M/D" (replace YYYY/M/D with the desired date, such as 2022/2/22) in the search bar and hit Enter.
3. Click the top checkbox.
4. Click the ‘Select all messages that match this search’ option.
5. Tap on the Trash bin icon to delete emails you no longer need.

How to Delete All or Multiple Emails From One Sender

1. Log in to your mail inbox.
2. If you want to delete emails from one sender, type their email address or the sender's name into the search bar and press Enter.
3. Click the top checkbox.
4. Click the ‘Select all conversations that match this search’ option to select all messages from this sender.
5. To delete the selected messages, click the Trash bin icon.

How to Mass Delete Emails on Gmail by Size

Follow these steps to delete large emails in Gmail:
1. Open your inbox and go to the search bar at the top.
2. In the search bar, type "larger:4M" (without quotes) to search for messages larger than 4MB. You can adjust the number according to your preference.
3. Gmail will display a message list matching the size criteria. Select the messages you want to clean. You can click on the checkbox beside each message to select it individually or click the top checkbox to select all.
4. Click on the Trash bin icon to send them to Trash.

Anyone can learn how to mass delete Gmail emails that fit specific criteria. Regardless of which messages you clean up, don’t forget to empty the Trash folder to free up precious storage space.

Complete Guide on How to Mass Delete Gmail (Android and iOS)

Deleting emails on mobile devices works differently from doing so on a computer. While the Gmail mobile app isn’t as robust as the desktop version, it can still help you keep your inbox organized on the go.

How to Mass Delete Gmail Emails on Android

If you use Android, follow these steps to remove multiple Gmail emails on your mobile device:
1. Open the Gmail app on your Android device
2. Tap and hold an email to enter the selection mode
3. Select the emails you want to delete
4. Tap the delete/trash icon

Click the ‘Select all’ option on the top left. This will let you select the first 50 emails in your inbox. However, if you scroll past them and hit the ‘Select all’ button again, the app will allow you to choose an additional 50, making it 100!

If you repeat the process, you can delete the desired number of emails you want. It’ll take some work, but it’s much faster than the tap-and-hold method.

Now, if you clean your inbox using the above tactic, you can use swipe actions to keep it clutter-free:
1. Open your Gmail app and tap the menu icon (three lines) in the top left corner
2. Go to ‘Settings’ and select ‘General settings’
3. Here, tap on ‘Swipe actions’
4. Set the swipe direction (right or left) to ‘Delete’ for quick email removal.

How to Mass Delete Emails in Gmail on iPhone

Compared to Android, the Gmail app for iPhone doesn’t support the tap-and-hold feature to select multiple emails. Instead, you can tap on the profile picture or sender’s avatar next to each email.

Once you’ve selected the emails you want, you can finally delete them by pressing on the ‘Trash’ icon.

In the Gmail app, you can employ swipe actions to make email deletion quicker and more efficient. Here’s how it works:
1. Open the Gmail app on your iPhone and tap the menu icon
2. Scroll down to ‘Settings’, click ‘Inbox customizations’, and select ‘Mail swipe actions’
3. Choose either ‘Right swipe’ or ‘Left swipe’
4. Set it to ‘Trash’ for quick deletion

With your swipe action set, you can now easily swipe on emails in your inbox to quickly send them to the trash.

13 Top-Ranked Third-Party Gmail Cleaner Tools

Cleaning up your email doesn’t just mean getting rid of old emails and starting fresh. Instead, using one of the top-rated email cleanup tools is an excellent idea to help you with the process. Not only can they help you get organized quickly, but they’ll also make your life easier moving forward.

These tools automate the organization and cleanup process, saving you time. You can think of them as robotic janitors for your email inbox. They help you eliminate the clutter and keep your Gmail (or other email accounts) nice and tidy. Some email cleaner apps are specialists doing one thing extraordinarily well. Others are more comprehensive, with every tool you can imagine (and then some).

1. Inbox Zapper

Inbox Zapper is the Gmail cleanup tool that works. With one click, Inbox Zapper allows you to:

Mass unsubscribe from emails and newsletters, and mass delete emails.
Scan your inbox for email lists and unwanted emails.

2. Trimbox.io

Trimbox is a simple Gmail plugin that makes keeping a clean inbox as easy as checking your email.

It lives directly in your Gmail inbox and tags each mailing list email with an unsubscribe button.

Whenever you see the button, just click it once and Trimbox will automatically unsubscribe you from the mailing list.
If you want to remove all of the old emails from that mailing list, just click the button one more time, and Trimbox will automatically delete all the emails from that sender in your inbox.

Since Trimbox lives directly in your inbox, you don’t have to remember to navigate to a separate site to clean your email. This makes Trimbox easy to adopt as a simple daily routine, so your inbox stays clean.

3. Clean.email

Clean.email is another great email cleaning app. It’s all about getting rid of the emails you no longer need in your inbox.

If they’re old, bloated with extra files, or irrelevant to your current work, Clean.email will help you delete them quickly and efficiently. It also has built-in tools to help you group emails, label them appropriately, and archive them if you want to review them later or store them permanently.

4. Mail Sweeper

Mail Sweeper is like a robot janitor for your inbox. Unimportant emails are collected in your dustpan and periodically moved to the trash. This helps conserve email storage space and avoid paying for extra Gmail storage.

Installation only takes a few minutes. Log in, answer a few questions, and click “Install.” Unlike some of the other products on this list, Mail Sweeper isn’t a subscription. Just a small one-time payment and Mail Sweeper will keep your inbox tidy forever.

5. Mailstrom

With Mailstrom, you can connect your Gmail, Outlook, or Yahoo! account and delete thousands of unnecessary emails in just a few clicks. You can easily filter messages based on factors like:

Sender
Date sent
Size
Clear out entire categories of messages

You can also unsubscribe from all those pesky marketing and sales lists you ended up on.

6. Unroll.me

If you’re interested in finally unsubscribing from all those annoying newsletters, Unroll.me might be the best email cleaner tool.

Once you link up your email address, you’ll get a near-instant breakdown of all your current subscriptions. From there, you can unsubscribe from anything and everything that’s no longer relevant to you. Plus, it’s completely free, so there’s no downside.

7. Cleanfox

Cleanfox is a similar app designed to help you escape the newsletters and marketing emails you no longer want.

With just a few clicks, you can clean your inbox of old emails that don’t have any value and ensure you receive fewer such emails in the future.

8. Sanebox

There’s also SaneBox, an email management tool compatible with any email service. With it, you can connect all your email accounts and create settings for organizational purposes.

Once you establish your priorities and habits, SaneBox will help you stay organized and provide daily digests that make your inbox clean and convenient.

9. Triage

Triage bills itself as “first aid for your inbox,” allowing you to quickly sort through your old, persistent messages with simple gestures. You can clear out months or even years of old messages in minutes.

The only catch is the app is only for iOS devices, so it’s not universally applicable.

10. ZenMail

This is a Firefox and Chrome extension that helps users screen and organize new emails. When you receive a new email, a screener asks what you want to do with any subsequent emails from the sender.

This way, you will be able to do away with unwanted newsletters easily. As messages come in, you can archive, delete, or even designate a specific folder or label for them. Consequently, you don’t have to be concerned about losing crucial emails when you remove a whole email folder.

11. Inbox Purge

With InboxPurge, detaching from unwanted newsletters and promotions is just a click away. No need for external apps or tools. Enjoy a streamlined email management experience right within your Gmail.

12. Shortwave

Shortwave is a free Gmail cleanup tool designed with productivity in mind. It offers several handy features that make it easy to organize your inbox and stay on task.

What makes this best free Gmail cleaner stand out from the rest of the options on this list is its overall approach to organization. Instead of lumping messages into folders based on commonalities, you create email threads so everything you need is in a single row. The app will automatically do this, but you can manually reorganize threads or combine them anytime.

13. Mailman

As an exclusive Gmail cleaner, Mailman is optimized to simplify organizing your Google’s inbox. Like other apps to clean Gmail inbox, Mailman allows you to block specific senders or remove yourself from subscription lists. You can use the VIP List to ensure you always see important messages from specific senders or emails that contain keywords you specify.

How to Permanently Delete Your Emails on Gmail

Trash is not a final resting place for your emails. When you delete emails in Gmail, they don’t just disappear. Instead, they are moved to the Trash folder, where they remain for 30 days before being permanently deleted. During this time, they are recoverable.

If you change your mind, you can restore the emails from the Trash back to your inbox or another folder. You can even select emails from multiple pages of the Trash to restore at once. Permanently deleting emails in Gmail, on the other hand, is an irreversible process. Once done, the emails are gone forever.

Permanently Delete All Gmail Emails on the Computer

Here are the steps to delete all emails from Gmail permanently:
1. Please go to the Gmail website, and click Inbox from the left control panel.
2. Check the box from the top left to choose all Gmail emails.
3. Choose the Delete icon from the top menu, or from the right-click menu.
4. Select More > Trash to open Gmail Trash, and click Empty Trash now to permanently delete emails in Gmail.

Permanently Delete Gmail Emails on Android

Here you can find the steps to delete Gmail emails on Android permanently:
1. Please open the Gmail app on your Android phone or tablet.
2. Click the Down arrow icon at the top left, and select All.
3. Click the Delete icon.
4. Then tap the three-dots icon at the top left, and choose Trash.
5. Hit Empty trash now to delete Gmail emails permanently on Android.

Permanently Delete Gmail Emails on iPhone/iPad

As a matter of fact, you cannot delete all Gmail emails on your iPhone or iPad; just do it on your computer. But you can delete one or multiple emails from Gmail permanently. Here are the steps:
1. Please open the Gmail app on your iPhone or iPad.
2. Tapping the image or letter next to an email, you can select multiple Gmail emails to delete.
3. Click Delete.
4. Tap the three dots icon at the top left, then choose Trash.
5. Click Empty Trash now to permanently delete emails from Gmail on iPhone.

Permanently Delete Google Account

Except for the above ways to permanently delete Gmail emails, you have another way to make it, delete your Google account. Before that, you have to know some important information about it. What happens if you delete your Google account? See below:

Data Loss: All associated data, like emails and files, will be permanently deleted.
Service Access: You’ll lose access to Google services like Gmail, Drive, and Photos.
App Connections: Access to apps and websites linked to your Google account may be lost.
Content Purchases: Purchased content on Google Play might become inaccessible.
YouTube: Your channel, videos, comments, and subscriptions could be removed.
Contacts and Communication: Google Contacts and communication history will be gone.
Google Pay: Payment methods and transaction history will be lost.
Photos and Videos: Content in Google Photos, including backups, will be deleted.
Device Data: Data from linked Android devices may disappear.
Security and Recovery: Account recovery for other services/devices won’t be possible.

Understand these outcomes might differ based on your account type and setup. Always back up important data before deleting it.

How to delete hacked Gmail account permanently? Here are the steps:
1. Please go to Google Account Data and Privacy page.
2. Click "More options" under the "Your data & privacy options" section.
3. Select Delete your Google Account.
4. Then follow the steps to delete your Google account permanently, including Gmail emails, Google Drive files, Google Photos, and more.

Clean Up Your Inbox With One-Click with Inbox Zapper's Gmail Cleanup Tool for Free Today

Inbox Zapper is the Gmail cleanup tool that works. With one click, Inbox Zapper allows you to:

Mass unsubscribe from emails and newsletters, and mass delete emails.
Scan your inbox for email lists and unwanted emails.

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