How to Use Filters for Email in 7 Ways

Inbox Zapper

May 5, 2025

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13 minutes

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Email can be a massive source of stress. You may find yourself staring at thousands of emails, not knowing where to begin. Fortunately, some tools can help you clean up your inbox, and one of the most effective methods is to use filters. Within the context of AI email organizers, filters allow you to sort your emails based on rules you determine automatically. This guide will explore how to use filters to clean up your Gmail faster with the help of an AI email organizer.

One great tool to help you get started is Inbox Zapper’s Gmail Cleanup tool. This tool makes filtering and deleting unwanted emails easy, allowing you to get to a clean inbox faster.

Benefits of Email Filters

Email filtering swiftly identifies and isolates spam emails, including those that pose security risks such as phishing attacks, which account for nearly 96 percent of phishing incidents. By automatically detecting and quarantining these emails, filtering reduces the likelihood of security breaches and the potential financial losses associated with business email compromise (BEC) attacks, which the FBI reports are over $50 billion.

Regain Control of Your Inbox with Email Filters

Categorization aids in organizing emails into manageable sections, allowing users to prioritize their responses and focus on emails first. This organization is particularly valuable because 83 percent of organizations reported successful email-based phishing attacks, indicating a high volume of malicious emails that need to be sifted through.

Manage Email Overload with Filters

With countries like the USA, China, and Russia leading in spam email generation, the sheer volume of spam emails is overwhelming. By filtering out these unwanted messages and categorizing the rest, individuals and organizations can manage their inboxes more efficiently, ensuring specific messages are not lost among spam.

Protect Your Data with Email Filters

Filtering helps safeguard sensitive information by preventing phishing emails and malware from reaching the inbox. This reduces the potential for malware to infect healthcare organizations' IT systems and gather sensitive patient health data. Since 39 percent of individuals have encountered suspicious email attachments, the need for email filtering to protect personal and organizational data cannot be overstated.

Types of Email Filters

The Ins and Outs of Content Filters

A content filter analyzes the text in an email and decides whether it is spam. If specific trigger words are used, the email will be quarantined.

The Ins and Outs of Block Lists

These filters block emails based on the sender. Any address flagged as a spam email sender will have its emails quarantined immediately. With a business spam filter, you can also customize your block list.

The Ins and Outs of Header Filters

Header filters examine an email's header. They search for inappropriate sources and IP addresses to prevent previously flagged senders from creating new email addresses.

The Ins and Outs of Language Filters

It’s assumed that people only want to receive emails in the languages they are fluent in. These email filters check for foreign languages to prevent communications in languages they are unlikely to understand.

The Ins and Outs of Rule-Based Filters

A rule-based filter allows you to customize your filters by applying specific rules. For example, if there’s a particular word or phrase within the body of an email, you could instruct your filter to send it to spam automatically.

The Ins and Outs of Bayesian Filters

A Bayesian filter learns your preferences by monitoring the emails you send to your spam folder. It observes what you mark as spam and attempts to decipher the trends and patterns to increase its accuracy.

How to Use Filters for Email in 7 Ways

1. Automatically Delete Unwanted Newsletters and Marketing Emails in Gmail

If you're like me, you sign up for email lists just to get a one-time discount. Then, from the moment I hand over my email address, I feel like I'm being haunted by the retailer's emails. In theory, Gmail should keep future marketing emails and promotional content out of sight and out of mind by moving them to the Promotions tab of my inbox. Still, sometimes, Gmail's built-in filters don't catch everything. Instead of manually unsubscribing from every newsletter, use a Gmail filter to do it for you. Here's how.

Click the show search options icon in Gmail's search bar.
Besides, type unsubscribe, then click Create filter.
Check Delete it, then click Create filter.

This filter tells Gmail to send any emails containing the word "unsubscribe which will apply to most newsletters and marketing emails you'll receivedirectly to the trash. Is the Gmail filter not catching every piece of promotional content? Add an OR operator to your filter to include other keywords commonly found in newsletters or marketing emails.

To make it even easier, you can copy and paste the following search terms beside Has the words in your filter unsubscribe OR "view in browser" OR "view as a web page" OR "privacy policy" OR "click here" OR "view online" OR "update your preferences" OR "opt out" OR "manage your account" If other marketing emails make it past your expanded filter, open those emails and look for unique keywords that they specifically use (i.e., keywords that are rarely used in the emails you want to land in my Primary inbox).

2. Automatically Archive Newsletters and Marketing Emails in Gmail

Auto-archiving newsletters and marketing emails works well if you're concerned that Gmail will unintentionally delete something important. Still, my go-to use case for this filter is for companies that occasionally send promo codes. For example, I don't need a notification in my inbox every time my local bookstore has a sale.

But when I am ready for some retail therapy, I can quickly scan through my archives to see if they recently sent me a coupon code. In Gmail, there isn't an archive folder. Instead, Gmail stores your archived emails under All Mail. Here's how you can create a filter that automatically archives newsletters and marketing emails:

Click the show search options icon in Gmail's search bar.
In addition to the words, type unsubscribe (you can also use the OR operator to include additional keywords), then click Create filter.
Check Skip the Inbox (Archive it), then click Create filter.

This filter automatically sends all emails that include the word unsubscribe (or any of your additional keywords) to your All Mail folder. While you won't see the emails in your inbox, you'll always have access to them in your archive.

3. Automatically Move Newsletters and Marketing Emails to a Specific Folder in Gmail

I'm a big fan of time blocking my tasks, which includes catching up on my newsletters once a week. To minimize getting distracted by other emails while I'm reading, I use a filter to store them in a dedicated folder automatically. This way, I can scan through them without feeling overwhelmed by all the other emails I have yet to address. You must create a new label (a.k.a.. folder) to do this.

In the main menu of your Gmail, click More to expand the menu.
Click Create new label.
Enter a label name, and click Create.
Now you can create a Gmail filter to automatically move all marketing emails to your new folder.
Click the show search options icon in Gmail's search bar.
Besides, type unsubscribe (you can also use the OR operator to include additional keywords), then click Create filter.
Check Skip the Inbox (Archive it).
Check Apply the label, and use its accompanying dropdown menu to select the desired label. In this example, the label is "Newsletters."
Click Create filter.

With this filter, Gmail will automatically move all emails that contain the word unsubscribe to the Newsletters folder.

4. Automatically Delete, Archive, or Move Emails from Specific Senders in Gmail

The three filters above allow you to use filters to batch delete, archive, or move (a.k.a label), but what if you just want to apply those filters to specific types of emails or emails from particular senders? There are a few ways to create more precise filters in Gmail.

Filter by email address

To automatically delete, archive, or label emails from a specific sender, enter that sender's email address in the From field of the filter form. Then, check the appropriate actions for the filter (delete, archive, or label).

Filter by email domain

If you want to automatically delete, archive, or label emails from all senders from a specific domain/company, use the wildcard operator. To do this, type an asterisk () before the @ symbol (e.g., @zapier.com) in the From field of the filter form.

Exclude specific senders from mass filters.

If you want to delete most marketing emails automatically, but still want to receive them from a particular domain/company, use the exclude operator to do this type -(@domain.com) in the From field of the filter form.

You can use this filter even if you filter for other keywords, subjects, or criteria.

5. Create Separate Inboxes to Manage Multiple Gmail Accounts

Do you manage multiple Gmail accounts? You may also have two Gmail accounts: one for work and another for personal use. Instead of toggling between accounts, use a Gmail filter to organize your emails into separate inboxes within one central account. Here's how.

Create a label for each account (e.g., Work and Personal receipts).
Click the show search options icon in Gmail's search bar to open the filter form.
Enter the email address for your first account into the To field, then click Create filter.
Check Skip the Inbox (Archive it).
Check Apply the label, and use its accompanying dropdown menu to select the appropriate label.
Click Create filter.
Repeat the above steps for each additional account.

This moves emails from your Primary inbox into individual queues that mimic account-specific inboxes. This filter is also helpful if you're trying to retire an old email address. It'll allow you to understand where you need to update your email address quickly.

6. Automatically Empty Your Spam Folder

There's only one kind of Spam I want in my life: the deliciously processed kind that comes in a tin that screams nostalgia. For all other spam that Gmail automatically funnels into my Spam folder, I use a filter to instantly and permanently delete it as soon as it arrives in my account. Here's how.

Open the filter form by clicking Gmail's search bar, which shows the search options icon.
Beside Has the words, type in: spam, then click Create filter. The in search operator tells Gmail to filter messages by their folder.
Check Delete it.
Click Create filter.

Note: Google doesn't recommend filter searches containing "in:" because they'll never match incoming mail. So, this filter shouldn't work. But after running the filter for about four days, my Spam folder remained empty when publishing this article, which was never the case before setting this filter.

7. Automatically Build a To-Do List in Gmail

You could use an app that was specifically designed to create to-do lists. You can also use your Gmail inbox, which gets the job done. Because I only ever email myself reminders of things I need to do—or send myself links to articles I want to read—I automatically use a filter to tag emails I send myself with my to-do label. Here's how to set it up.

Create a To-do label if you don't have one already.

Open the filter form by clicking Gmail's search bar, which shows the search options icon.
Besides From, enter your email address.
Check Skip the Inbox (Archive it).
Check and apply the label and use its accompanying dropdown menu to select the appropriate label.
Click Create filter.

You can also use this filter for emails from others, such as your boss, a client, an editor, etc., that always include tasks you must complete. Simply substitute their email for yours in the From field of the filter form, or use the OR operator to have Gmail automatically label incoming emails from specific addresses (for example, myemail@gmail.com OR boss@gmail.com).

10 Email Filtering Tools for Email Protection

1. Inbox Zapper: Your Gmail Cleanup Buddy

Forget about the old days of managing your Gmail inbox. Inbox Zapper helps you achieve Gmail Zen in no time. This Gmail cleanup tool scans your inbox and looks for unwanted emails and lists. With one click, you can mass delete these emails and mass unsubscribe from email lists. What’s more, Inbox Zapper is entirely private.

None of your email data ever leaves your computer. The tool was designed with privacy in mind, unlike other tools that resell your data. Join 15,687 people who have used Inbox Zapper to clean 28,384,924 emails. For now, Inbox Zapper only supports Gmail, but we will also expand to other email services. Try Inbox Zapper’s Gmail cleanup tool for free today to clean up your Gmail inbox with one click.

2. SpamTitan Email Security

SpamTitan Email Security is at the forefront of cyber security and provides email and web protection solutions and data archiving. The robust email filtering tool SpamTitan Email Security protects organizations from spam emails and other malicious threats such as phishing attempts, ransomware, viruses, and suspicious URLs. With a built-in Secure Email Gateway (SEG), the solution is able to block 99.9% of threats entering the system while also providing double antivirus protection by employing Bitdefender and Clam AV engines. SpamTitan Email Security supports a rich feature set that encompasses a robust spam-blocking engine with whitelisting and blacklisting capabilities, as well as inbound email scans against phishing in real time. It also offers outbound email scanning in order to help prevent any data loss and blacklisting.

There are also six bundled out-of-the-box Real-Time Blacklists (RBLs), content filtering, and data leak prevention (DLP). Users can access reports of quarantined emails directly from inboxes, while admins are armed with granular, easily customizable policies to suit their needs. SpamTitan Email Security can be easily deployed, configured, and used, and integrates particularly well with Office 365, making it an excellent solution for businesses looking to bolster their Office 365 email security. For SMBs and MSPs hoping to get their hands on a low-maintenance but effective anti-spam solution, we recommend SpamTitan.

3. Mailvelope: Secure Your Emails with OpenPGP Encryption

Mailvelope is a free browser extension that integrates with your webmail interface, making sending and receiving encrypted emails easy. The tool uses the OpenPGP encryption standard to encrypt your emails, helping you secure private communications and prevent unauthorized access. Mailvelope works with all major mailing platforms, including Gmail, Yahoo Mail, and Outlook Mail.

4. Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud

Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud, released in 2014, is a well-featured substitute for SpamExperts and an easy-to-use email spam and malware filtering tool. This goes much further in a comprehensive approach for users looking for more than an email filter tool. Acronis is a cloud-based deployment platform that makes it possible to integrate features for email security with data backup and recovery processes. For instance, while handling pricing factors, there is little difference between SpamExperts and Acronis Cloud; they each take a different approach to eCommerce, using Acronis as a more holistic approach to secure mission-critical applications and highly traffic-oriented websites.

5. SpamAssassin

This is an open-source server-side filter offering a powerful customization tool. This tool is somewhat similar to Mailvelope, but unlike Mailvelope, SpamAssassin tackles the problem of spam emails using another process – spam filtering.

6. MimeCast

Mimecast is one of the few enterprise email filtering tool providers capable of offering well-rounded security against email threats. Their solution uses AI, machine learning, and social graphing to show highly advanced protection systems against spam, targeted attacks, and phishing attacks. The solutions by Mimecast come in two different builds with or without a gateway, depending upon customer requirement; the Cloud Integrated build is a simplified, cloud server platform that doesn’t even require MX record changes; the Cloud Gateway build is an advanced model for more complex environments. The cloud-integrated solution is a part of Mimecast and is meant to be solely deployed solely into the environment of Microsoft 365 or above. It is easy and fast to deploy, and provides correct detection of phishing attacks, impersonation attacks, and malicious links, attachments, and QR codes.

This also comes with a 30-day scan back, a 1-click-remedy function, and warning banners that notify end users of suspicious emails. The Cloud Gateway secures Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, on-premises, cloud, or hybrid environments. The product offers multiple-layer inspection for inbound and outbound email, making it immune to social engineering. Homoglyph/homograph deception and impersonation attacks. This top email filtering tool also integrates URL rewriting, static file analysis, and sandboxing to protect against malicious attachment links or QR codes utilized by spammers.

Furthermore, a social graph is integrated into the solution to capture an anomaly in the user’s communication patterns. This calls on AI capability to generate a warning alert banner when appropriate. Finally, it integrates with other security tools such as SIEM, SOAR, TIP, and XDR platforms. Mimecast offerings include DMARC management, email backup and archiving, and security awareness training products.

7. Mailwasher

This software application is designed especially for Windows users to fight spam emails. Unlike SpamAssassin, which works on the server-side model, Mailwasher acts as a personal spam filter for a desktop. It offers you complete control over what emails you want to receive in your inbox.

8. Avanan

There are many ways to reap benefits with Avanan Cloud, another competitor of SpamExperts, launched in 2015 to help keep your inbox safe. Like Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud, Avanan is also a cloud-deployed email filtering tool for mailboxes. Besides that, it is very famous for its collaborative tools, such as Slack and Teams, which help improve the security of the mailbox. It’s powered by an AI engine that continually learns and recalibrates itself to identify new patterns in ongoing hits, up-to-date types of threats, spam, and malware.

9. SpamSieve

This is a spam filter designed especially for macOS users. SpamSieve uses the Bayesian filtering method to discover and stop spam emails from entering the inbox. It is designed while maintaining an easy-to-use policy; therefore, it can be easily integrated by various email platforms, such as Apple Mail, Outlook, Gmail, etc.

10. Microsoft Defender

Microsoft Defender for Office 365, formerly identified as Office 365 Advanced Threat Protection (ATP), was released in September 2015. The service is best for people who are hosting already or planning to host their own Windows VPS server. Since it is close and easily integrated into the existing Microsoft infrastructure, spam filter allotment for email becomes easy.

Clean Up Your Inbox With One-Click with Inbox Zapper's Gmail Cleanup Tool for Free Today

If you suffer from email overload, you’re not alone. The average Gmail user has 42,000 emails in their inbox. If you need help sifting through that mountain of digital clutter, I recommend Inbox Zapper, a tool designed to help you clean up your Gmail inbox. With one click, Inbox Zapper scans your inbox, finds emails from mailing lists and newsletters, and allows you to mass unsubscribe and delete them. Unlike other email cleanup tools, the tool was built with privacy in mind and does not collect or sell your data.

How Inbox Zapper Works

After you connect Inbox Zapper to your Gmail account, the tool scans your inbox for email lists and unwanted emails. It then presents you with a list of these emails so you can choose to unsubscribe from them, delete them, or both. You can preview the emails before taking action to ensure you don’t delete anything important. Within minutes, you can declutter your inbox by tens of thousands of emails without doing it individually. Try Inbox Zapper's Gmail cleanup tool for free today to clean up your Gmail inbox with one click.

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