How to delete all emails on iPhone and iPad

Apple Mail on iOS has a trio of features making the app more useful than ever: document attachments, intelligent searching with Proactive and enhanced multitasking features on the iPad.

Aside from these headline enhancements, Mail on iOS includes a couple nice-to-haves, among them an easily overlooked feature to quickly delete all your emails in an inbox with just a few taps. This can save you a lot of time and help tame your inbox.

In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to delete all emails on iPhone and iPad in the Mail app.

How to trash all emails in iPhone or iPad Mail app

1) Launch Mail on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad.

2) In the inbox list, tap on an inbox you’d like to wipe clean.

3) Tap the Edit button.

4) Select the first email in the list by marking the circle next to it.

5) Tap and hold Move at the bottom.

6) While still holding Move, deselect the first email in the list that you just marked.

7) Release your finger from Move.

8) The screen that appears next lets you move all messages. So, select Trash.

Can I delete all messages permanently?

As mentioned, trashed emails are moved into a special server folder before they’re permanently wiped after a preset period of time (the default is usually 30 days).

1) Head to the Trash folder for the inbox you want to delete messages from.

2) Tap Edit.

3) Select Delete All from the bottom.

Can I get my trashed emails back?

Depending on your email provider and device settings, you should be able to undelete trashed emails. Start by selecting your inbox and choose Trash.

Now hit Edit, select the messages you wish to recover, tap on Move and choose the inbox where you’d like to move them. For some email services, such as iCloud, iOS’s Settings app lets you choose a period of time after which trashed emails get wiped from the server for good.

Wrapping it up

Hopefully you’ve learned a few new tricks to help you master your emails and bring order to your inbox, using Mail.

If you like this how-to, do share it on social media and pass it along to your friends. If you want, you can submit you own tutorial ideas at [email protected].