Search, filters, and tags

When your mailbox has thousands of messages, the slow way to find one email is to scroll. The fast way is to remember a single detail — a name, a word, roughly when it arrived — and let MailDesk do the rest. This page shows you how to find any email in seconds, trim a busy folder down to just what matters, and use colour-coded tags to turn your inbox into a tidy worklist.

When your mailbox has thousands of messages, the slow way to find one email is to scroll. The fast way is to remember a single detail — a name, a word, roughly when it arrived — and let MailDesk do the rest. This page shows you how to find any email in seconds, trim a busy folder down to just what matters, and use colour-coded tags to turn your inbox into a tidy worklist.

Available in: Basic. Search, the filter bar, and tags are built into the core MailDesk engine, so they work exactly the same whether you run Basic or Pro. Pro layers a mobile-adaptive view and AI-assisted ranking on top of the very same search — nothing here changes.

The three tools, at a glance

You have three complementary ways to get to an email, and they combine freely.

• Search — type what you remember into the box at the top of the message list. MailDesk matches your words against the sender, the sender's display name, the subject, the To and Cc recipients, the short preview, and — for messages you have already opened — the full body of the email. Results are ranked, with the closest subject and sender matches first.
• Filters — one-click chips above the list (All, Unread, Starred, Incoming, Outgoing) plus a small Filter options menu that adds a By Contact picker. Filters narrow what you are already looking at.
• Tags — colour-coded labels you create and apply inside MailDesk. One email can carry several. They live only in MailDesk and never touch your mail server, which makes them perfect for lightweight workflows like To do, Waiting, or Invoice.

Finding email with search

Search is almost always faster than browsing. You do not need an exact match — partial words are fine, and results refresh as you type.

1. Open MailDesk and select the mailbox you want to look in.
2. Click the Search mail… box at the top of the message list.
3. Type part of what you remember — a person's name, a word from the subject, or a phrase you recall from the body.
4. Watch the list narrow to the matches, with the most relevant message at the top.

What search looks inside

MailDesk doesn't just match subjects. A single search term is checked against all of these:

• the sender's email address,
• the sender's display name (the friendly name, e.g. Anna Becker),
• the subject,
• the To and Cc recipients,
• the short preview of the message, and
• the full body of any email you have already opened.

Subject and sender matches are treated as the strongest signal and float to the top, followed by recipient matches, then text found deeper in the body. So a search for an order number, a project name, or a colleague's surname will surface the right thread first.

Search respects the folder you are in

Search always runs inside the context you are looking at, so you stay in control of how wide the net is cast:

• If a folder is selected, search runs inside that folder only.
• If no folder is selected, search runs across all of your synced folders.

Pick Inbox first if you only want recent mail; switch to Archive or Sent to search those instead. On a very large mailbox, choosing a folder first also keeps the search tightly focused.

Trimming a folder with the filter bar

Above every message list is a row of filter chips. Tap one to narrow the list; tap All to clear the narrowing and show everything again. Filters are the quickest way to turn a full folder into a short to-do list.

The Filter options menu

Next to the search box is a small Filter options button — a funnel icon labelled All. It opens a short menu with the same direction and status choices, plus a contact picker:

• By Contact — pick a person to show only their mail.
• Incoming / Outgoing — received or sent mail.
• Only Unread / Only Starred — the same as the Unread and Starred chips.
• Reset — clear every active filter in one click.

Filters and search are a team

A filter and a search term always combine. A couple of everyday examples:

• Open Sent, switch on Outgoing, and type a keyword to pinpoint a specific message you once sent.
• Open the Archive folder and search by sender to pull an old conversation back into view.
• Switch on Unread, then type invoice to clear today's new bills before lunch.

Organising work with colour tags

Tags are colour-coded labels you apply to emails inside MailDesk. One email can carry several, and they shine for lightweight, personal workflows — think To do, Waiting, Important, Invoice, or Follow up. Because they're visual, a glance down the list tells you the state of everything.

Create and apply a tag

1. Select a message (or open it), then choose Assign Tags… — either from the right-click menu on a message row, or from the tag button on the toolbar.
2. In the Assign Tags dialog you can either:
   • click an existing tag pill to select it (selected pills are highlighted), or
   • type a name under Create New Tag, pick a colour, and click Create.
3. Click Apply to save your choices, or Cancel to discard them.

The dialog title shows how many tags are currently selected, so you always know exactly what is about to be applied.

Filter the list down to a single tag

Your tags appear under a Tags heading in the folder sidebar, ready to act as instant filters.

1. Click a tag to show every email that carries it.
2. Click more tags to add them to the filter — tags toggle on and off as you click, so you can layer them or peel them back.
3. Use the clear control next to the Tags heading to remove all tag filters at once.

And, as always, a tag filter combines with a typed search. Tag Waiting plus the word invoice gives you every invoice you are still chasing — one click and one word.

Tags or folders — which should I use?

Both organise mail, but they answer different questions. Folders mirror where mail lives on your server; tags describe what you need to do with it.

In most cases, a small, consistent set of tags is all you need. Start with three or four, add folders only if you genuinely require a permanent home for something, and you'll keep the whole system easy to read at a glance.

What you should see

• Typing in the search box narrows the list to matching messages, most relevant first.
• A filter chip turns active and the list shows only matching messages; All clears it.
• Applying a tag adds a coloured pill to the message; clicking that tag in the sidebar later brings back every message that carries it.

Troubleshooting

Related

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