How to delete more than 50 emails in Gmail at once
Gmail only selects the 50 emails on the page you can see. Here is how to select every match and delete or archive thousands at once.
You tick the box at the top of your Gmail inbox, press delete, and only 50 emails go. Gmail selects the emails on the page you can see, not every email that matches. There is a second step most people miss.
Delete every email that matches, on a computer
- Open Gmail in a web browser.
- Search for the emails you want gone. For example
from:newsletter@example.com,older_than:1y, orcategory:promotions. - Tick the box at the top left, above the list. This selects the 50 on the page.
- A line appears above the list: Select all conversations that match this search. Click it.
- Click the trash icon to delete, or the archive icon to archive. Gmail asks you to confirm for a large batch.
Big batches can take a few minutes. Leave the tab open until the count reaches zero.
Useful searches before you delete
| Search | What it finds |
|---|---|
older_than:2y |
Everything older than two years |
category:promotions |
The Promotions tab |
is:unread older_than:6m |
Unread email you have ignored for six months |
larger:10M |
Emails bigger than 10 MB, the ones eating your storage |
has:attachment older_than:1y |
Old emails with files |
On a phone
The Gmail app has no "select all matches". You can long-press one email, then tap the others one at a time. For anything more than a handful, use a computer.
Deleted is not gone yet
Deleted emails sit in Trash for 30 days, and they still count against your storage until then. To free the space now, open Trash and click Empty Trash now.
Archiving is often the better choice. An archived email leaves your inbox but stays searchable, so nothing is lost if you need it later.
How to do this in Perfect Mail
There is no 50-email limit and no second "select all matches" step.
Everything older than a date: Open Settings, choose Mass archive, and pick a date under Archive everything before. Perfect Mail tells you about how many emails that is. Click Review archive, confirm, and it runs in the background while you keep working. Everything it moves stays in Done (All mail in Gmail), so search still finds it.
A batch you pick: For a smaller batch, open Emails, tick the box on a row (or press X), and Shift-click to pick a run. Click Select all to take every email in the list, then Done (or press E) to archive them all at once.
A whole category: in Categories, choose the chips you want (Newsletters, for example) and click Mark all done. Perfect Mail says how many emails that is before it moves them.
Perfect Mail archives rather than deletes, so you never lose something you needed. If storage is the problem, delete the large ones in Gmail with larger:10M.