16 Mar 2023

Inboxes and other special folders

If you need to manage numerous email accounts, you are sure to appreciate eM Client’s unified inboxes, favorite, search, and tag folders. These special shortcuts allow you to browse emails based on their type and quickly access the default folders of your email accounts without having to scroll and look for the specific account or a folder to find that one message you were looking for.

eM Client special folders

What exactly are these special folders?

Think of the special folders as your bookmark tab or the shortcut that will quickly display the folders' contents and messages with tags/labels. You can also create custom search folders with permanent criteria if you are often looking for messages with some specific attributes. The upside? You don’t have to enter the same search criteria in the search again and again, or if you are extensively using tags, you can easily display all the messages that have a specific tag assigned. Let’s see how to use special folders and how they can help you with email management.

Inboxes

New feature that has been introduced in version 9 will take your productivity to another level. No more scrolling through the account list or looking up which account received which message. The most frequently used folder is usually an inbox where all your incoming messages go and now there is a way to manage them all in one place while having messages sorted between their respective accounts.

Don’t take our word for it, see how you can use the “Inboxes” special folder in the video below.

The “Inboxes” special folder unifies all the Inbox folders of your email accounts under one section, but keeps them separate so you know at all times which inbox you’re currently checking. In contrast to the “All Inboxes” special folder under “Favorites”, it offers a more organized view and it makes distinguishing personal and work inboxes and their contents way easier.

The Inboxes section will not be displayed without adding at least two email accounts, and once you add the second account it should appear above the “Favorites” section. Expanding “Inboxes” will reveal all of the accounts you have in eM Client, through these you can access their respective inboxes.
It is also possible to manually apply the rule or mark all messages as read in the selected Inbox, same goes for the following special folders.
You can enable or hide these folders in Menu > Settings > General > General, using the option “Show Inboxes folder”.

Favorites

This folders section will be displayed right away as it is enabled by default. It can be used to bookmark individual folders and there’s a set of pre-defined, frequently used folders added straight out of the box. If you want to add more folders, right-click on any folder under your email account and select ”Add to favorites”. The folder will appear under “Favorites” and it will be easier to access in the future. This special folder is an excellent feature for users who use the Inbox Zero method because you can swiftly access all the important folders from the “Favorites” section.

With favorites, you can also view “All Inboxes”, “Unread”, “Flagged” and other special folders that will display the contents of specific folders or messages with special attributes (such as Snoozed, Flagged, Unreplied, and so on.) across all of your accounts in one convenient location.

Search folders

Search folders are hidden by default and in order to enable this feature you need to right-click on “Favorites”, go to “Display”, and at the bottom of the “Display” menu you will see “Search folders”. Adding “Search folders” to the toolbar will allow you to configure something like a permanent search shortcut.

To create a search folder, right-click on the “Search Folders” title and select “New Search folder”. That will open a window similar to the advanced search but this window serves the purpose of setting up a search folder.

You can name the new search folder, select individual folders you want to be included in the search, keywords, and much more.
When you are done, hit OK and the search folder will appear in the left pane. When opened it will display all the messages that fit the search parameters.

If you are searching for similar items often, this feature might be a lifesaver for you as it can create a pre-set for the search so the results will be always one click away.

Tags

Tags” are the last special folders on our list. They are hidden at first but they can be added to the folder list as well (right-click in the special folders area > Display > Tags).

eM Client already has some default tags but if you add more under Menu > Tags, they will be all displayed in the left menu folder list. If you want to create remove or edit the existing ones, it’s possible as well and you can even pick a color (select a tag and click on “Edit” in the “Tags” menu) if the default ones aren’t your cup of tea.
Tag a message using right-click > Tag and in the menu click on the tag you have just applied. The tagged message should be displayed and so will the other messages that have the same tag.

Aside from local tags that are displayed in the left menu, eM Client also supports the sync of Gmail labels and Exchange categories. You can also sync local tags with these providers. eM Client will pair them automatically as long as the local tags have the same names as the labels/categories on the server. So, if you were using this feature in another email client or webmail, all of your tags should be synced with their respective accounts which makes the transition to eM Client even easier.

New to eM Client?

Try it out! It's free and fabulous.

If you’re ready for more, buy the PRO license and enjoy:

  • unlimited email accounts

  • unlimited commercial use

  • professional VIP support

  • Notes and Attachments sections

  • Snooze Email

  • Mass Mail

  • Send Email Later

  • Watch for Replies
    and more.

And in the meantime, check out our YouTube channel for how-to videos.