How to Delete Old Emails in Gmail Quickly

Deleting old or the oldest emails in your Gmail is a very smart thing to do when you want to consider creating more storage space for incoming emails.

There are different ways you can achieve this using the Gmail filter to sort through emails and create different methods to help you free up storage.

Firstly, I want to let you know that I know and understand what you are going through because I’ve been there myself.

I understand how challenging it gets especially when you are trying to delete some specific old emails without deleting some important email.

But hey, I got you.

From my experience, I found simple ways to help you delete any set of email in gmail.

This way has everything to do with filtering what you want to delete and what you want to keep.

Now, this is where gmail filter comes in to play. Allow me to explain.

Tip – Remember to clear your trash after deleting anything in your gmail to create more space.

What Is Gmail Filter?

Gmail filter gives you the option of creating a filter by setting rules on how you want gmail to find your search result. Think of it like a custom search.

For example,

Let’s assume I want to delete every email or email addresses before 2018,

With gmail filter, I can create a custom search to help me find all the emails before 2018.

After it’s done searching and showing me the results, I can select everything all at once and then delete.

If you still don’t get it, here are some features of what gmail filters is capable of.

What Can Gmail Filters Do?

Like I mentioned earlier, Gmail filter gives you custom rules to enables you narrow down your search results.

These custom rules are:

• From – You can search for emails received from any email address.
• To – Search for emails sent to any email address.
• Subjects – Emails containing a word included in its subject.
• Has the words – Emails that contains specific words.
• Doesn’t have – Emails that doesn’t contain a specific word.
• Size – Emails through their file size either big or small.
• Date within – Emails before, after or within a specific period.
• Search – Emails either in your inbox, draft, spam, all email and many more.
• Has attachment – Emails that includes any attachment.
• Don’t include chats – Emails that doesn’t include any chat history.

From these custom rules, you can clearly see that you basically have every tool to help you sort through and find old emails you want to delete.

Now that you have understood what gmail filter is, all that is left is how creative you can be with it based on what you are looking for.

If you still don’t know how to search for your old mails, keep reading.

How to Create Gmail Filter

Here’s a simple way to create gmail filter.

Follow the instructions carefully.

1. Log in to your gmail.

2. Click on the drop-down arrow in the search box.

3. The gmail filter will be revealed to you once you click on the drop-down arrow.

4. Now you can begin creating a filter for your search in gmail.

11 Methods to Delete Old Emails in Gmail

If you are unable to use the gmail filter to delete your desired emails, here are different manual search approach to delete old or oldest emails while you are in gmail.

1. Old Emails Received From Any Email Address

Search for this command in gmail.

from:(email address or name of sender)

Replace email address or name of sender with your specified email address or name of sender without the bracket.

Here’s an example,

2. Old Emails Sent to Any Email Address

Search for this command in gmail.

to:(email address or name of receiver)

Replace email address or name of receiver with your specified email address or name of receiver without the bracket.

Here’s an example,

3. Old Emails Containing a Particular Subject

Search for this command in gmail.

subject:(keyword)

Replace keyword with the subject word you are looking for without the bracket.

Here’s an example,

4. Old Emails Containing a Particular Word

Search for this command in gmail.

(keyword)

Replace keyword with the word that can be found included in a subject without the bracket.

Here’s an example,

5. Old Emails That Doesn’t Containing a Particular Word

Search for this command in gmail.

-(keyword)

Replace keyword with the word that can’t be found inside the email you want to delete without the bracket.

Here’s an example,

6. Old Emails Larger Than a Given Size

Search for this command in gmail.

larger:(email size)

Replace email size to the actual size of email you want displayed without the bracket.

If you want to delete emails larger than 5MB in gmail, set email size to 5M without including the bracket

Note –

• GB = G
• MB = M
• KB = K
• Bytes = Don’t add any alphabets, just only write the number

Here’s an example,

7. Old Emails Smaller Than a Given Size

Search for this command in gmail.

smaller:(email size)

Replace email size to the actual size of email you want displayed without the bracket.

If you want to delete emails smaller than 10MB in gmail, set email size to 10M without including the bracket

Note –

• GB = G
• MB = M
• KB = K
• Bytes = Don’t add any alphabets, just only write the number

Here’s an example,

8. Old Emails Between a Specific Period

Search for this command in gmail.

after:2020/5/11 before:2020/5/14

Replace the dates with your own desired dates.

Make sure the after date is older than the before date.

With the command above, this will show you all the emails between 2020/5/11 and 2020/5/14

Here’s an example,

9. Old Emails After a Specific Date

Search for this command in gmail.

after:2020/5/11

Replace the date with your own desired date.

This will show you all the emails after the dates you searched for.

Here’s an example,

10. Old Emails Before a Specific Date

Search for this command in gmail.

before:2020/5/11

Replace the date with your own desired date.

This will show you all the emails before the dates you specified in the search.

Here’s an example,

11. Old Emails Containing Attachments

Search for this command in gmail.

has:attachment

This will show you all the emails that contains any attachment.

Here’s an example,

How to Delete Old Emails in Gmail in Bulk

After getting your filtered results, here’s how to mass delete those emails.

1. Check the box above your emails to select everything displayed.

2. Click on select all conversations that match this search.

3. Now, click on the delete or trash icon to bulk delete all the emails.

You are not done. Your emails are deleted but are still stored in your trash which contributes heavily to your storage space.

So, you must empty your trash in gmail to completely create more space.

How to Empty Trash in Gmail

Here’s how,

1. While in your Gmail, navigate the left section and click on more to reveal more options.

2. Scroll down till you see trash and click on it.

3. Inside trash, click on empty trash now to create more storage space.