NICEVILLE, Fla. — Gmail labels and folders can be confusing, especially when emails seem to vanish after being deleted. In this week’s It’s Geek to Me column, Jeff Werner explains how Gmail’s system of tags and labels works, and why a deleted message may disappear from multiple places at once.
QUESTION:
I recently signed up to receive Kim Komando’s daily email. Fun to read, good information. Coming to you, rather than her, to get another perspective. I get her emails via Gmail. An odd thing is that it appears in the Inbox with a label ‘Komando’ in a grayed box at the start of the Subject line.
Early in the process, I deleted one of those emails, and they also disappeared from the other folder/label. I’m leery about removing an email I’d like to keep, afraid that it will disappear entirely. I’m sure I didn’t connect Inbox, Promotions or Komando in Gmail, so I can’t understand why that would happen. Doesn’t happen with other Gmails.
– Morris F.,
Navarre, Florida
ANSWER:
Kim Komando is one of the giants of tech Q&A, with two daily and one weekend radio show. She also authors various written media, such as her Daily Tech Update, newsletters, e-books, and a syndicated USA Today column.
She calls herself America’s Digital Goddess and is among the most successful radio talk show hosts in the country.
Morris, this is one of those occasions where a screenshot would have helped. While your description of “a label Komando in a grayed box at the start of the Subject line” is thorough, Gmail supports many features, including labels, filters, and tags, which makes it difficult to know exactly which you’re seeing.
One possibility is that you have a filter in your Gmail that automatically applies a tag named “Komando” to incoming emails from her newsletter. This has the effect of grouping them together and marking them with the name of the tag. Gmail tags appear in a gray box next to the subject line, which matches what you described.
It’s important to note that Gmail does not use folders in the traditional sense. Instead, each email exists in “All Mail” and has one or more tags applied.
For example, a newsletter email may have both the “Inbox” tag and the “Komando” tag, making it appear in both places. That doesn’t mean there are two copies of the email — just one email with multiple tags.
When you clicked “Delete,” you weren’t just removing the tag. You were deleting the conversation thread entirely, which is why it disappeared from both your Inbox and the Komando group.
If your Gmail Trash hasn’t been emptied, you should still find it there. From Trash, you can move it back to your Inbox and reapply the Komando label if you want to keep it.
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“Life is filled with unanswered questions, but it is the courage to seek those answers that continues to give meaning to life. You can spend your life wallowing in despair, wondering why you were the one who was led towards the road strewn with pain, or you can be grateful that you are strong enough to survive it.”
– J.D. Stroube, from his book Caged by Damnation
In case you hadn’t noticed, I have the happy privilege of answering another reader’s question this week! That is a cause for minor celebration. Enjoy.
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To view additional content, comment on articles, or submit a question, visit my website at ItsGeekToMe.co (not .com!)
Jeff Werner, a software engineer based in Niceville, Florida, has been writing his popular “It’s Geek to Me” tech column since 2007. He shares his expertise to help readers solve everyday tech challenges.
