Your inbox runneth over? How to reduce email mess and stress

So I set off in search of a less rocky climb. I talked to productivity experts, downloaded apps and tried features built into Gmail and Microsoft’s Outlook mail service. I am getting along much better now.

Russell Johnson, professor of management at Michigan State University, suggested checking your inbox less frequently, and tackling email when it won’t interfere with other work tasks, such as at home before getting on your commute. He says it can take up to 90 minutes to mentally transition from one task to another.

Disable immediate notifications for low-priority messages, he added. On an iOS or Android device, you can go to Settings, then Notifications, to disable alerts for your email app. On iPhones, you can also schedule notifications to arrive at specific times. (Android doesn’t have a similar feature.)

Turning off email alerts is a luxury that many of us can’t afford, however. Modern work has so invaded our inboxes that our work itself lives in our emails.

The major email providers are trying to help. At the end of January, Google completed the rollout of a new Gmail interface that gives more prominent placement to labels, which have helped me organize messages. Microsoft is unveiling new tools for Outlook, too. You can now react to emails with emojis, saving time on having to craft a response to a note where a simple thumbs-up would suffice.

Here are other timesaving, productivity-boosting tips for tackling the mess.

A new view

In the past, I spent the majority of my time separating high-priority emails from…everything else. Now, I let the email app do that for me.

Gmail: For my personal inbox, where I receive a lot of marketing mail, I like Gmail’s inbox tabs view. It automatically sorts messages into categories such as Primary and Promotions. In settings, click the Inbox tab, then select the Default inbox type. If Gmail places a message into the wrong category, train the algorithm by dragging that message to the preferred tab.

For my work inbox, I prefer the “Important first” inbox type. Importance is determined by a Gmail algorithm that considers which emails you open and reply to. It effectively surfaces email from VIPs.

Outlook: Focused Inbox separates important email messages from everything else. From the web, go to Settings, then enable Focused Inbox. Right-click incorrectly sorted messages to move them from one inbox to another.

Priorities, priorities

If you’re afraid of missing something important, you can also elect to get notifications only for the most important messages.

Gmail: In settings on desktop or mobile, tap on Email notifications. If you have the default inbox type, the best option is “High priority only.” If you have an “Important first” inbox, you’ll also have an option for “Important section only.”

Outlook: In settings on the website or mobile app, go to General, then Notifications and under “Send me notifications,” select “Messages from favorite people.” Add people to your favorites by selecting the star next to their names.

Task master

Not all responses are equal. For email that needs more careful consideration, park the message in a task list—just don’t forget to add a reminder to revisit it.

Gmail: In the inbox view on a web browser, select an email, then click the Tasks icon (a check mark with a plus) above the inbox to add it to the Tasks list. You can view Tasks and set a due date or add sub-tasks from the right side pane. From the mobile app, open a message, then tap the three dots icon on the top right and select Add to Tasks.

Outlook: Any messages you flag appear in Microsoft To Do. In the To Do app, you can add a reminder or a due date.

Clean sweep

Do you think your inbox needs a reset, rather than a tuneup? With caveats, I recommend trying a mailbox-management app. Of the handful I tested, I liked Clean Email best.

First, you connect your email account to the service, which is available as a web, desktop or mobile app. For Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo or AOL, you can sign in directly. For other account types, such as Apple’s iCloud, you might need additional settings.

For my Gmail account, Clean Email suggested deleting Google Flights alerts and marketing emails from HBO Max and others. It also gathered all the email with an unsubscribe option in one place. Clean Email’s best feature? Big buttons to quickly delete batches of emails and unsubscribe.

The service will analyze a limited number of messages free. After that, it’s $10 a month or $30 a year.

Before using Clean Email, I had 17,677 unread emails. Now, it’s a fraction of that. But I had to give the service access to my email.

According to the company’s privacy policy, Clean Email can’t see your email-login credentials, which are encrypted, and says it will “never share, give away, sell, analyze, anonymize or otherwise use your data.” It says its algorithms analyze email subject lines and senders, but not contents or attachments.

If you want to try this on your work email, check first with your IT administrator.

Email to burn

Next time you need an email address to sign up for a spam-triggering freebie such as coffee shop Wi-Fi, use a disposable address. Get a temporary address at 10minutemail.com where, as you might imagine, the email lasts just 10 minutes.

While a “burner” email won’t help you climb your current mountain of email, it could stop the summit from getting any higher.