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Archived emails aren’t deleted. They live in All Mail and keep every label except Inbox, which is what archiving removes. To bring one back, find it and apply Inbox (or any other label) to it.

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Find the email

Three reliable ways:
  • Search. Press / and type any part of the subject, sender, or body. Search covers archived mail by default.
  • All Mail view. Click All Mail in the left sidebar (or press g a). This shows every thread in the account, archived or not.
  • A label view. If you remember the label (Newsletter, Billing, a custom one), open that label from the sidebar; archived mail with that label still appears there.

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Restore to Inbox

Open the thread (or select it from the list) and press Shift+E (Mark not done). You can also press Cmd+K and search “mark not done”. The thread returns to the Inbox view immediately and the importance label sorting still applies.

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Restore multiple emails at once

Select multiple threads from any list view (x to toggle selection on each, or click the checkboxes), then press Shift+E. Every selected thread comes back to Inbox in one action. The same selection works from search results, so you can search by sender and restore everything from one person in two keystrokes.
For very large restores (say, “everything from this sender in the last 90 days”), ask the agent. Open the AI Agent with Cmd+/ and say “restore every email from alex@example.com to my inbox.”

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Apply a different label

If you don’t want the email back in Inbox but want it filed under a different label:
1

Open the thread

Or select multiple threads.
2

Press l

The label picker opens. Type to filter.
3

Pick a label

Press Enter. The label is applied immediately. You can apply more than one.
To remove the current label without adding a new one, press y from a label tab. In a Gmail label tab that removes the Gmail label, and in an Outlook folder tab it files the email back to your Inbox. To change Gmail labels without moving the email, press Cmd+K and choose Set Gmail label to add or remove them, or Shift+Y to remove them all. See Labels.

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Drag and drop

On desktop, you can drag a thread from any list view onto a label or Inbox in the left sidebar. The thread moves to that destination (or, if you hold Option, gets the label added without removing the current one). Drag and drop is desktop-only. On mobile, use the swipe-left action menu and pick Move to → Inbox or the label you want.

Search overview

Find archived mail quickly.

Inbox views

All Mail, label views, and filters.

Batch processing

Operate on many threads at once.

Keyboard shortcuts

Every shortcut Slashy supports.

Labels

Importance labels and Gmail label tabs.