Add or remove inbox categories in Gmail

To help keep your inbox organized, use inbox categories. With inbox categories, Gmail sorts your emails into different categories automatically, such as social media updates or promotions.

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Learn about inbox categories

When you turn on the “Default” inbox type, you can show one or more categories in your inbox:

• Primary: Emails from people you know and messages that don’t appear in other tabs.
• Social: Messages from social networks and media-sharing sites.
• Promotions: Deals, offers, and other promotional emails.
• Updates: Automated confirmations, notifications, statements, and reminders that may not need immediate attention.
• Forums: Messages from online groups, discussion boards, and mailing lists.

Tip: If you have more than 250,000 emails in your inbox, you can’t turn on inbox categories. To get below the limit, delete or archive your emails

Add or remove inbox categories

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Gmail app .
2. At the top left, tap Menu Settings.
3. Under "Inbox," tap Inbox type.
4. Tap Default Inbox.
5. At the top left, tap Settings.
6. Tap Inbox customizations Inbox categories.
7. Turn on one or more categories.

Tip: You can choose different notifications for each category. Learn how Gmail notifications work.

Turn off inbox categories

1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Gmail app .
2. At the top left, tap Menu .
3. Tap Settings.
4. Select your account.
5. Tap Inbox customizations Inbox categories.
6. Turn off one or more categories.
7. To hide all inbox categories:
   • Turn off all categories.
   • Select another inbox type.

Find emails in a category

Important: Archived emails don’t appear in inbox categories. To find archived emails, go to the “All mail” label in Gmail.

1. At the top, in the search bar, enter category:.
2. Enter the category name before your search term:
   • primary
   • social
   • updates
   • forums
   • reservations
   • purchases

For example, category:social party shows you emails under the “Social” category that include "party."

Tip: While you can search for emails that match the “Reservations” or “Purchases” categories, you can’t select these categories in your inbox.

• Reservations: Flight confirmations, hotel bookings, and restaurant reservations.
• Purchases: Order, shipping, and delivery confirmations.

Organize low priority emails

• For emails that don’t require your immediate attention, such as order confirmations and reminders, you may find them under the “Updates” category. 
• To help you prioritize important emails, “Updates” may be enabled if the “Primary,” “Social,” and “Promotions” categories are on.
• To turn off the “Updates” category:
  1. On your iPhone or iPad, open the Gmail app .
  2. At the top left, tap Menu .
  3. Tap Settings.
  4. Select your account.
  5. Tap Inbox customizations Inbox categories.
  6. Turn off Updates.

Improve how Gmail sorts your messages

To stay in control of where your email goes in an inbox category, you can:

• Move a message from one category to another:
  1. In the Gmail app, select one or more emails.
  2. At the top right, tap More .
  3. Tap Move to.
  4. Select a category.
• Star an email: When you star an email, it appears in your “Primary” category and remains in any category they were already in. Learn how to star emails.
• Create a filter: In Gmail, set up a filter that marks email from specific senders as important or that directs it to a category you choose. Learn how to set up filters.
• Add senders to Google Contacts: When you add a sender to your contact list, it tells Gmail you’re getting email from someone you know. Learn how to add contacts.
• Reply to the email: When you interact with a sender, it tells Gmail that you’re familiar with the sender. Learn how to reply in Gmail.

Check the number of messages in your inbox

In Gmail, replies to a message are grouped into conversations. In your inbox, you can find the number of conversations you have, but not messages.

Follow these steps to see how many messages are in your inbox:

1. On your computer, open Gmail.
   • You can't find your total number of messages from the Gmail app.
2. In the top right, click Settings .
3. Click See all settings.
4. Scroll down to the "Conversation view" section.
5. Turn off Conversation view.
6. At the bottom of the page, click Save Changes.
7. To view the number of messages, go to your inbox.
   • If you have multiple sections or categories, add the numbers from each section together.
8. When you finish, return to the Settings page.
9. Turn on Conversation view.

Related resources

• Change your Gmail inbox layout
• Change Gmail notifications
• How Gmail ads work