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Experimenting with Gmail Filters

Monday, January 5th, 2009 - 1:48 pm - Not-Sales

I’m a filter whore with Gmail.   Everything gets a tag, usually auto archived away to its folder where I can promptly ignore it.   After joining the Inbox Zero mindset, I started to think that having things auto archived from Gmail’s inbox didn’t really count.   I wasn’t acting on these messages anyway, and often missed emails entirely.

So today starts a new experiment:   I turned off the “Archive It (Skip the Inbox)” button on all of the rules in my personal Gmail account so that everything hits my inbox now and I have to manually archive them away.    My thought process is that at least this way I have to actively scan the headlines before deciding whether or not to ignore them.   This will also make Inbox Zero a true Zero, where all of my incoming bits are managed.    I’ll try this for a week or so and report back as to my progress.


  • http://brian.shaler.name/ Brian

    That could be dangerous, depending on how much email you get per day and how much of it is not actionable. I set up my filters in a way that they auto-archive emails that are definitely not actionable. If there is any doubt, they’re tagged, but left in the inbox. I actually live in the All Mail view where the inbox and starred items mean I need to do something and I skim through the rest. I’m not saying my method is the best way, by any means. It’s just how I do it and how I keep my sanity while receiving 50-200 emails a day.

    • http://chrisconrey.com conrey

      If I recieved a ton of non-actionable email then I’d agree, but for a week I’m going to see how much I can take.

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