How To Use Gmail: Complete Guide

If you’re unknown to Gmail, you’ve likely noticed that it acts a little differently than other email applications. Once you get the drop of Gmail, it’s incredibly straightforward to use! This article guides you on how to send emails, organize your inbox, and complete other basic tasks in Gmail. Keep in mind that, before you can operate Gmail, you’ll need to make a Gmail account if you don’t already have one.

How to Use Gmail on Your Desktop

Comprehending how to utilize Google’s Gmail is easy. This Gmail tutorial will cover the most significant features you should learn about and how to utilize them.

First, let’s sign up for a Gmail account.

How to Sign Up for Gmail

To operate Google Gmail, you’ll require a Gmail account.

In case you don’t have a Google account already, here’s how you can make an email account:

Step 1

Go to gmail.com and click the Create an account button.

Create account button

Step 2
When the sign-up form emerges, enter your First name, Last name, Username, and Password.

Sign up form

Step 3

Add Recovery number and Recovery email points for added security (optional).
Then, add your date of birth and gender.
Once you’ve documented these details, click Next.

Next button

Step 4
After you’ve checked Google’s Terms of Service and Privacy Policy, Hit on I agree.

I agree button

Step 5
You’ll then be taken to the homepage of your unique Gmail account.

Gmail homepage

B. How to Sign In to Gmail

Here’s how you can sign in to Gmail with your email address:

Step 1

Unlock Gmail and hit on the Sign in button.

Sign in button

Step 2
Enter your phone number or email and click Next.

Next Sign in

Step 3
Type in your password and click Next to open your inbox.

Next password

C. How to Compose and Send an Email in Gmail

Here’s how to compose and mail emails in Google Gmail:

Step 1

Log in to Gmail from your desktop and hit on the Compose button on your left.

Compose button

Step 2
In the New Message window, document the recipient email IDs in the To field and add your subject line in the Subject field.

New message window

Step 3
Add Cc (carbon copy) or Bcc (blind carbon copy) recipients if you like to send mail copies to anyone.

CC and BCC

Step 4
Enter your message and hit Send when complete.

Send button

D. How to Respond to Emails in Gmail

When you welcome a new email in the Gmail inbox, you can notice the sender’s name and the subject underlined in bold.

Here’s how you can reply to an email you’ve received in Gmail:

Step 1

Log in to Gmail and open the email message you like to reply to by clicking on it.

Step 2

Hit on the Reply arrow.

Reply arrow button

Step 3
A preview pane will open with the name of the someone you’re replying to in the To field.

Preview pane

Step 4
Type your response message and click Send.

Send 2

To operate Gmail offline:

  • Open Gmail and hit on the gear icon at the top to open the Quick Settings menu.
  • Click on See all settings and move to the Offline tab.
  • Click on the radio button after  Enable offline mail.
  • Hit Save changes to begin utilizing Gmail offline.

E. How to Organize Your Gmail Inbox

If you’re like most someones these days, your inbox is probably bombarded with incoming messages — product notifications, promotions, newsletters, cold emails, and more. As a consequence, keeping your mailbox managed can be overwhelming.

Fortunately, Gmail presents multiple organizational features to help manage your emails smoothly, such as:

  • Labels
  • Starred Emails
  • Filters
  • Archive/Delete Emails

Here’s a short look at some of these features:

  1. Labels

The Gmail label function allows you to organize your inbox better.

Unlike Microsoft Outlook, which just lets you add an email to one folder, Gmail allows you to add numerous labels to a single email. In this method, an email can exist in more than one category at the same time.

I’ll show you how to:

  • Create a Gmail label
  • Add Labels to Emails
  • Search for Labeled Emails 

Let’s first review how you can make a label in Gmail.

  1. How to Make a Gmail Label

Step 1: Log in to Gmail and click on Gmail Settings (gear icon) around the top right corner.

Settings icon

Step 2
In the Quick Settings dialog box that opens, click on Notice all settings.

See all settings button

Step 3
Choose the Labels tab.

Labels tab

Step 4
Scroll down and hit on Create new label.

Create new label

Step 5
In the pop-up window, document a name for the new Gmail label and choose a label (or folder) to nest it under (optional).

New label name

Step 6
Hit on Create.

Create button
ii. How to Add Labels to an Email in Gmail

Here’s how easy it is to add a label to an email.

Step 1
Open the email you like to add a label to and hit on the Label icon at the top.

Label icon

Document the name of the label in the search box or choose one from the label list.
You can add numerous labels to a single email by reviewing the boxes next to the label names.

Label as

Step 3
hit on Apply.

Apply

Step 4
The chosen labels will be added to the email.

selected labels added

Once you’ve added the labels, you can effortlessly search for labeled emails.

I’ll guide you on how next.

  1. How to Locate an Email with a Specific Gmail Label

Follow these steps to locate an email that you’ve labeled:

Step 1

Open Gmail and scroll through the sidebar on the left until you see the needed folder.

Work related tab

Step 2
Click on the folder to show all the emails within that specific label. Then, you can choose the needed email from the list.

Select email

2. Starred Emails

Gmail permits you to star essential emails for straightforward organization.

I’ll guide you on how to star essential emails and search for your starred emails.

How to Star Essential Emails

Step1

Open Gmail and locate the email you like to star.

Find email

Click on the star icon next to the needed email.

The star will turn yellow, implying that the email has been starred.

Yellow star
ii. How to Search for Starred Emails

Once an email has been starred, searching for that email is easy.

Here’s how to do it:

Step 1

Open Gmail and choose the Starred folder in the left side pane.

Starred tab

Step 2
The Starred folder will open with all your starred emails in it.

Starred emails

Next, I’ll guide you on how to filter your emails utilizing the Gmail Filter feature.

  1. Gmail Filters

Once you make Gmail filters, Gmail can automatically handle incoming messages to the various folders in your inbox.

Here’s how it’s done:

Step 1

Open Gmail and hit the Show search options icon on the right of the search mail bar.

Show search button

Step 2
Enter your search criteria (From, Size ,To, Has the words, Date, etc.) and click the Create filter button.

Create filter option

Step 3
Choose what you like Gmail to do with the filtered emails from the list and click Create filter.

Create filter button

Step 4
A notification box will emerges confirming that your filter has been created.

Filter created notification

Once your Gmail filters have been made, you won’t have to sort and manage Gmail messages manually — the filter will do it for you automatically.

Archive Emails or Delete Emails

Do you only like to keep essential emails in your inbox?

Then you can archive emails or delete insignificant emails.

Here’s how:

Archive Emails

Step 1

Open Gmail and choose the numerous emails you like to archive by clicking on the checkbox next to each email.

checkboxes

Step 2
Hit on the Archive icon at the top.

Archive icon

Step 3
A black pop-up window will emerges, indicating that the chosen emails have been archived.

Black pop-up
ii. Delete Emails

Here’s how you can delete undesirable emails in Gmail:

Step 1

Open Gmail and choose the emails you like to delete utilizing the checkboxes.

select images to delete

Step 2
Hit on the trash bin icon to delete the selected emails.

Delete icon

What’s the distinction between archived emails and deleted emails?

Archiving emails lets you clean up your inbox by dragging desired emails (archive emails) from your inbox into the All Mail folder (which you can always access from the left sidebar).

Unlike archived emails, deleted emails are driven to the Trash folder (located below the spam folder) and eternally deleted after 30 days.

Final Thoughts

Gmail is a wonderful tool to send and receive emails, manage your inbox, perform searches,add signatures, and carry out chats and meetings.

However, even with its arsenal of features, Gmail falls short when it comes to sending bulk emails, personalizing emails, or developing insights into how recipients engage with your emails.

Eram N.
Author: Eram N.

I have been serving web content with my passionate writing skills since 2020. My skills have benefited clients from 20 countries, resulting in 10x audience interactions, improved readability, and SEO-friendly content.

Eram N.
I have been serving web content with my passionate writing skills since 2020. My skills have benefited clients from 20 countries, resulting in 10x audience interactions, improved readability, and SEO-friendly content.