How to Recover Missing Emails in Gmail

Created by JR Lopez, Modified on Tue, 10 Oct, 2023 at 12:04 PM by JR Lopez

There are few ways to find missing emails. They might have gone to spam, been archived or deleted, or something else.

  1. 1. Check your spam. It's possible the missing email was caught by Gmail's spam filter. Select Spam from the left menu pane. (You may have to scroll down and select More to reveal the Spam folder.) Browse the list of emails in the Spam folder. If you find the missing email, select the checkbox next to it, then select Not spam.

    Warning: Emails marked as Spam stay in the Spam folder for 30 days and then are permanently deleted. Once deleted from the Spam folder you will not be able to access the missing email.

  2. 2. Check your trash bin. It's possible your missing email was accidentally sent to the trash bin. From the left menu pane, select MoreTrash. If you find the email you're looking for, right-click it and choose Move to inbox.

    On a touchscreen, press and hold the message and then choose Move to inbox.

    Warning: Emails sent to the Trash folder are permanently deleted after 30 days. If you deleted an email more than 30 days ago, it is gone forever.

  3. 3. Check the Social, Promotions, and Updates tabs. Your missing email may be categorized as a promotional or social email, which have their own Inboxes in Gmail. Select either the SocialPromotions, or Updates tab. If you want to move any of these emails to your main inbox, click and drag the email to the Primary inbox.

  4. 4.Review your archived emails. It's possible an email was archived without you realizing it. While this option will display all of your emails in one inbox, it will also contain any messages that might have been archived.


  5. 5. Use the Gmail search function. The email you're looking for may be buried beneath other emails. Use Gmail's built-in search function to find it quickly by entering the email's subject, recipient, original sender, or body text.

    Tip: If you don't want to dig through all of your Spam or Social emails, use the search function within individual folders to narrow down the results.

  6. 6, Use the Gmail Message Recovery Tool. If none of the above tips works and you need to find an email, the Recovery Tool may be able to help. Although the service is typically reserved for hacked accounts or when an email has been maliciously deleted, it can sometimes dig up lost emails.

    Tip: Provide as much information about the missing email as you can, including the date you first noticed it was missing. Only emails that were deleted within the last 30 days will be recoverable.


    source: https://www.lifewire.com/how-to-recover-missing-emails-gmail-4585081#:~:text=There%20are%20several%20causes%20for,or%20deleted%20those%20messages%20accidentally.

Was this article helpful?

That’s Great!

Thank you for your feedback

Sorry! We couldn't be helpful

Thank you for your feedback

Let us know how can we improve this article!

Select at least one of the reasons
CAPTCHA verification is required.

Feedback sent

We appreciate your effort and will try to fix the article