Show Only Unread Emails in Mail for Mac OS X

Managing large numbers of emails can be time consuming, but one way to help tackle email on the Mac is by setting up an Unread Emails Only inbox. This allows Mac users to easily view unread mail messages without having to scroll through already read emails, since only the new or unread emails will be visible. The great thing about this approach is that it spans all inboxes and email accounts that are setup within Mail for Mac, though you can certainly specify accounts if you wanted to.

We’re going to demonstrate how to setup a smart mailbox in Mail for Mac OS X that will be used to view unread emails exclusively. All of your regular emails will still be intact in the regular inbox, the smart mailbox is essentially just a presorted inbox. As unread messages are marked as read, they will leave the unread inbox automatically, making the smart inbox perfect for managing backlogs of unread emails.

How to Show Unread Emails Only in Mail for Mac OS X

This method relies on creating a smart inbox that will display only unread email messages for any and all accounts setup within Mail for Mac.

1. Open Mail on the Mac if you have not done so already
2. Pull down the “Mailbox” menu and choose “New Smart Mailbox”



3. Give the smart mailbox a name like “Unread Emails Only” then set the following parameters, then click OK to create the unread inbox*:

• Contains messages that match “all” of the following conditions”
• “Message is unread”

When “Unread emails only” (or whatever you named the inbox) is selected, only the unread messages in your Mail app will be shown. Unread emails in Mail app are signified by the blue dot that appears next to the email within the inbox, and in this case all of the mail messages will show the blue dot because they’re unread.

If you have no unread email messages, this smart mailbox will be empty.

Switching between the smart mailbox of Unread messages only, and between your regular inbox and mailboxes is just a matter of choosing the inbox to use from the left sidebar in Mail app as usual.

* Note that if you want to display only unread emails for a specific email account, you’d need to add another parameter to specify that inbox

Of course this approach is for Mac Mail app, but iOS users can also view only Unread email on iPhone and iPad with a special Unread inbox. Additionally, if you’re a webmail user you can show all Unread messages in Gmail using a simple sorting trick as well.

Know of any other helpful Mail tips? Let us know in the comments.