Use Smart Mailboxes in Mail on Mac
You can create Smart Mailboxes that automatically organise email messages into a single mailbox, based on criteria you specify. For example, a Smart Mailbox could display all the emails you receive about a specific project, regardless of which mailboxes they’re stored in.
Tip: Mail provides a default Smart Mailbox named Today, which shows emails viewed during the current day. If it doesn’t appear in the Mail sidebar, move the pointer over the Smart Mailboxes section, then click .
Create Smart Mailboxes
Go to the Mail app
on your Mac.
Choose Mailbox > New Smart Mailbox.
Enter a name for the Smart Mailbox.
For example, if you create a Smart Mailbox to organise emails from your soccer group that include an attachment, you could call it Soccer schedules.
Specify the criteria.
Set the first condition: Click the first pop-up menu, choose an option (such as From, Subject or Sender is member of group), then complete the condition using the other menus or fields that are shown (they vary depending on your choice in the first pop-up menu).
For example, if you chose From, you can choose “contains” or “begins with” in the second pop-up menu, then enter a sender’s name in the text field. If you chose “Sender is member of group” in the first pop-up menu, you can choose a group name in the second pop-up menu.
Add or remove conditions: To set additional conditions, click
. To remove a condition, click
.
Set the scope of multiple conditions: If you have at least two conditions, a pop-up menu appears that lets you choose whether an email must meet any or all the conditions to be included in the Smart Mailbox.
Include messages from the Trash or Sent mailbox: Select the tick box to include emails that are in those mailboxes in your Smart Mailbox.
Click OK.
Whenever you select your Smart Mailbox in the sidebar, emails that match its criteria are listed.
You can also create a Smart Mailbox by copying and editing an existing one. In the Mail sidebar, select the existing Smart Mailbox, choose Mailbox > Duplicate Smart Mailbox, then edit the duplicate.
Edit Smart Mailboxes
Go to the Mail app
In the Mail sidebar, double-click a Smart Mailbox (or select one, then choose Mailbox > Edit Smart Mailbox).
Change, add or remove conditions, or change other criteria.
Click OK.
Rename Smart Mailboxes
Go to the Mail app
In the Mail sidebar, select a Smart Mailbox.
Choose Mailbox > Rename Mailbox, then enter a new name.
Delete Smart Mailboxes
Go to the Mail app
In the Mail sidebar, select a Smart Mailbox.
Choose Mailbox > Delete Mailbox.
The emails that were listed when you viewed the Smart Mailbox aren’t deleted.
Create Smart Mailbox folders
If you use Smart Mailboxes, you can organise them into Smart Mailbox folders.
Go to the Mail app
Choose Mailbox > New Smart Mailbox Folder.
Enter a name, then click OK.
Drag one or more Smart Mailboxes into the folder.
When you view the folder, emails from the Smart Mailboxes that the folder contains are shown.
If you change an email while viewing it in a Smart Mailbox — such as marking the email as read or unread or moving or deleting it — the change is reflected in the mailbox where the email is stored.
If you use iCloud Drive, your Smart Mailboxes are available on your other Mac computers that have iCloud Drive turned on and Mail selected in iCloud Drive options. See Use iCloud Drive to store documents.