how to recover deleted emails on mac
to recover deleted emails on mac, open the trash mailbox in the mail sidebar and drag the message to another mailbox, or select it and choose message > move to. apple says deleted messages are available until they are permanently erased, so check trash before anything else.
this guide follows apple's mail user guide for macos 27, apple's icloud mail guide and google's gmail help, all read on october 30, 2026.
download remynd for mac to search text you read in a focused window, by app and date.
where can a deleted email still be?
a deleted email can sit in more than one place, depending on the account. this table follows apple's delete emails guide, apple's icloud mail guide and google's gmail help.
| place to check | what the source says | see |
|---|---|---|
| the trash mailbox in mail | kept until permanently erased, if a trash mailbox is set | mailbox behaviors |
| icloud mail trash | by default, kept for a set time; might be deleted sooner in another app, depending on the app's settings | icloud section |
| gmail trash | kept for a set time; deleted drafts can't be recovered | gmail section |
| a time machine backup | can restore content mail downloaded, based on options set in mail and on your mac | time machine section |
how do you recover a deleted email in mail?
you recover a deleted email in mail by moving it out of the trash mailbox. apple's steps:
- open the mail app on your mac.
- click a trash mailbox in the mail sidebar.
- drag the message to another mailbox, or select it and choose message > move to > [mailbox].
in our view, a date search is a quick way to find one message in a full trash. apple's own example, in its delete guide, finds messages dated august 1 through september 5, 2021 with date:8/01/21-9/05/21 typed into mail's search field.
why is the trash mailbox empty?
mail's mailbox behaviors settings decide whether deleted messages are kept. apple's mailbox behaviors guide describes these options:
- trash mailbox. choose a mailbox on the server or on your mac, or none. with none, apple says deleted messages are removed and are not available in the trash mailbox. apple lists this option for imap accounts only.
- erase deleted messages. this sets when mail permanently deletes messages in trash. apple suggests a setting other than never, to stay under your provider's storage limits.
- your provider's own rules. apple says that if your email provider sets up the server to delete older messages, they are deleted regardless of how you set erase deleted messages.
to check, choose mail > settings, click accounts, select the account, then click mailbox behaviors. apple adds that the settings shown vary by account type.
apple also notes that if you pick an on my mac mailbox, the messages live on your mac and nowhere else. in our read, that means a trash mailbox kept on your mac will not show up on your other devices.
how do you recover deleted icloud mail?
on icloud.com, a deleted email goes to trash by default. apple says it is saved there for 30 days, then permanently erased, and that deleting it on icloud.com deletes it on all your devices with mail turned on in icloud settings.
apple also says you can change the folder deleted emails move to, or set icloud mail to permanently and immediately erase emails when you delete them, instead of moving them to the trash. if trash is empty, check mailbox behavior in icloud mail settings.
apple adds an important exception. if you view icloud mail in another app, for example mail on an iphone or ipad, apple says your mail might be deleted sooner, depending on the app's settings. when you empty the trash, apple says, the emails are permanently deleted and you can't recover them.
how do you recover deleted gmail messages?
google says a message you delete in gmail moves to trash. for up to 30 days after deletion, google says, you can recover it from trash and move it back to your inbox; after that, you can't recover it.
google also says you can't recover a deleted draft from trash. in our view, the gmail.com trash is worth checking too if mail's trash mailbox looks empty.
can time machine bring back an email?
it can help with what mail had already downloaded. apple's delete emails guide says time machine backups of your mac can restore content mail downloaded, based on options set in mail and on your mac.
for files rather than messages, see how to recover deleted files on mac.
do people struggle to find information at work?
microsoft's work trend index, published may 9, 2023, surveyed 31,000 full-time employed or self-employed people in 31 markets.
62% of microsoft's respondents said they struggle with spending too much of their workday searching for information, and 86% were looking for ai to help find the information and answers they need. in our view, a deleted email is one small version of that search.
where does remynd fit?
remynd records your screen on a mac, runs ocr locally with apple vision, and keeps the searchable index on your mac. text comes from the focused window only, and video covers windows you have not excluded.
in our view, it fits the email you read and then lost: you can search the text you saw rather than the mailbox.
press control space, search in plain language, refine by app, date or source, and jump to the moment, provided remynd was running then and the window was not excluded. private browser windows are excluded by default, and you can exclude apps and sites. it needs macos 14 or later on an apple silicon mac, and it is free to download.
for the wider question, see find something you saw on your screen.
limits of this guide
this guide covers apple mail, icloud mail and gmail, so a few things sit outside it.
- it follows apple's and google's pages as read in october 2026; we did not test older macos versions.
- outlook, exchange and other providers set their own retention rules, which we did not check.
- work accounts can have admin retention policies that this guide does not cover.
download remynd for mac to search text you read in a focused window, by app and date.