when trying to locate an old email, gmail gives you several parameters to help you narrow down your search, including the recipient’s name, subject line, and file size, among many others.
If you know the exact date (or even the approximate time period) that you received the email, this will also help you locate older messages more easily.
When searching for an email by date, use the search bar at the top of the gmail panel. just enter the relevant text/numbers and press enter.
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find an email before or after a certain date
in the following examples:
- yyyy = year (eg 2020)
- mm = month (eg 01)
- dd = day (for example, 23)
To locate emails received before a certain date, type in the search bar before:yyyy/mm/dd and press enter.
so, for example, if you want to search for emails received before January 17, 2015, type:
To locate emails received after a certain date, type in the search bar after:yyyy/mm/dd and press enter.
for example, if you want to search for emails that were received after January 1, 2020, type:
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find an email between two dates
gmail also allows you to locate emails that were received during a particular period by combining the after and before conditions in the advanced search function.
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so if you want to locate an email sent between January 1, 2020 and January 3, 2020, type:
find an email that is older or later than a certain time period
in the following examples:
- older_than finds emails older than the specified days, months, or years.
- newer_than finds emails older than the specified days , months, or years.
- d, m, and denotes the day, month, or year.
To find an email received more than 6 months ago, type:
To locate an email received in the last 2 years, type:
combining “before” and “after” with “newer than” and “older than”
And finally, you can get even more granularity by searching for emails that were sent after a specific date, but are older than a certain number of days, months, or years.
so if you want to find an email received after February 1, 2017, but is older than 5 months, type.
reduce date search with keywords
Once you’ve gotten used to using the date-based search syntax, you can start including keywords to further narrow your search.
if, for example, you want to locate an email between November and December 2019 about billing, type:
(Note that in this example, the search starts in late October and ends in early January to capture the full date range).
In general, gmail excels in its search functionality. once you know the relevant syntax for your search needs, you can start locating your old emails in seconds, instead of hours.
updating your gmail account
As good as gmail is, and don’t get us wrong, we love gmail, there are some things it just doesn’t do right out of the box. that’s where the right inbox comes into play. With the right inbox, you can turn your Gmail interface into a productivity powerhouse with features like email tracking, email templates, and email reminders.
for example, gmail email tracking lets you know who opened your emails and when, while our gmail email templates feature lets you configure templates and insert them easily. in an email whenever you need it, so you don’t have to worry about writing the same emails over and over again.
how do i search gmail for old emails? you can use the search option in gmail to search your entire inbox. just type a keyword in the search bar and hit enter. The results will include all the emails you have sent or received since you started using gmail.
However, suppose you want to find specific types of messages, such as old emails from specific individuals, even those that are older than a specific date range. in that case, there are a few more options:
You can narrow your search by date range, sender, subject line, and attachments (you’ll need to have advanced search enabled first).
You can also use filters to limit your search results. filters include keywords like “shipped on” or “from” as well as date ranges like “last week”.
gmail search by date FAQ
can you search gmail by date?
You can use google’s advanced search options to find specific messages by date. for example, enter that date in the search bar if you want to find all messages sent on February 2nd. 15, 2017. You’ll see all emails sent on that day appear in response to your request.
can you search gmail by specific time?
no, google does not currently offer an option to search for a specific year in its advanced search feature. however, there are ways around this limitation by using more specific keywords (such as “2016”). you can search gmail by time in various ways.
can you search gmail by year?
yes, it is possible; you can use the search bar at the top of your inbox to type in a keyword or phrase. for example, if you want to search for emails sent within the last week, use “last week”. if you want to search for emails sent during the previous month, use “last month”.
Secondly, you can use filters to restrict the results by timestamps. For example, if it’s March and you’re looking for emails from people who live on the East Coast, filter your search by date range: “March-East Coast” will show only those messages with timestamps between March 1 and March 30 April.