Customize your Inbox

Spark has three types of Inbox: Classic (Simple List), Smart (Unread Cards), and Smart 2.0 (Focused List).

Here’s how you can distinguish between these options and choose the one that works best for you: 

• Classic Inbox, or Simple List, is a plain list of all emails sorted by date or by recents. If you prefer simplicity, this might be your best choice. It is also helpful to quickly find the most recent email, such as a one-time verification code or delivery confirmation. 
• Smart Inbox, or Unread Cards, nicely groups all unread emails into People, Notifications, and Newsletters. There are also Pins and Seen. Gatekeeper, a Premium feature, filters emails from news at the top of the inbox and senders, and shows where the user can accept or block the sender. It is helpful for scanning unread emails and supports customizable card actions for quick batch processing.
• Smart Inbox 2.0, or Focused List, sorts all your emails while making the focus on important conversations, Priority emails. Pins, Notifications, Newsletters, Invitations, Invitation Responds, and Assigned to me categories are listed at the top below the Priority emails, with no previews cluttering your Inbox; you can customize and tailor the preferred setup for this Inbox in Spark Settings > Inbox > Focused List. 

Smart Inbox 2.0 (Focused List) enhances your productivity with the Done mechanics. When a message does not need further processing, mark it as Done, and it will be easily accessed from the Archive folder. Alternatively, you can keep track of Done emails by enabling the Mark as done toggle in your Inbox.

Smart Inbox (Unread Cards) gathers unread emails from your accounts and sorts them into three categories. The emails are sorted by date, with new emails at the top of the inbox. While reading messages, they are being moved to the Seen section at the bottom. Unread Cards, such as People, Notifications, and Newsletters, also support Card Action (Mark as Read, Mark as Done, Delete). The card action performs the batch action on all visible emails in the card.

Smart and Smart 2.0 (Unread Cards and Focused List) views help you manage your emails faster; you can focus on important messages and quickly clear the rest. Spark allows you to customize the Smart Inbox and Smart Inbox 2.0 (Unread Cards and Focused List) to work optimally for you. Meanwhile, you can switch to the Classic Inbox (Simple List) on your devices, where all emails are displayed chronologically to find the most recent email quickly. You can do so by using the switcher at the top left of the screen. 

Customize your Smart Inbox 2.0 (Focused List)

Spark offers various Email Groups to display in the Smart Inbox 2.0. You can choose the ones you want to group:

• Priority — displays senders and threads you marked as priority.
• Notifications — shows messages from services.
• Newsletters — displays regular emails from the websites you’ve subscribed to.
• Pinned — contains the emails you’ve pinned.
• Assigned to Me - displays all emails delegated to you.
• Invitations — displays all Calendar invitations.
• Invitation Responses – shows all replied invitations.

Group Position determines where your groups will be placed in the Inbox.

When selecting Stick to Today, email groups will be displayed next to the Today section, regardless of when the last email in the group was received.

Using the Chronological position, groups are placed in the Inbox next to the date the last email was received in a specific group.

You can also choose the number of Priority emails shown in Spark Settings > Inbox > Priority. 

Another great feature you can adjust is Gatekeeper (included in the Premium plan)—you can choose where to block or accept new senders. 

Adjust the email grouping in Smart Inbox 2.0

Apart from the Email Categories grouping, you can use an additional customization option in Smart Inbox 2.0 (Focused List). For example, you can adjust Gatekeeper, Priority, and accounts grouping Settings.

Once you access the Gatekeeper settings, you can choose where to accept or block new senders:

• Screen new senders before the inbox.
• Screen new senders inside the inbox.
• Don't review (Accept all new senders).

It will look slightly different on your mobile devices: 

• On top of the inbox.
• Inside an email.
• Off.

For Priority Settings, you can select how many Priority emails will be displayed in the Preview in the Inbox. You can select from 1 up to 10 emails in the Preview. If you have more emails in Priority, select All Emails.

You can choose one of the three options for account grouping:

• The Group option will disable all the above email group settings and will create an account group containing all emails received for this account in the Inbox. The name of such an account group will be the same as your account name in Account Settings.
• Show All will display emails from the specific account using the Email Categories Settings above.
• Hide All works like disabling the toggle for Show this account in Unified Inbox in the Accounts Settings. It hides all emails from a specific account in the Unified Inbox.

Customize your Smart Inbox (Unread Cards)

Spark offers various cards to display in the Smart Inbox (Unread Cards). You can choose the ones you need:

• Gatekeeper— will be shown atop the inbox for Premium users in the inbox view.
• Priority — displays emails you've marked as priority.
• People — displays emails from other people.
• Notifications — shows messages from services.
• Newsletters — displays regular emails from the websites you’ve subscribed to.
• Pins — contain the emails you’ve pinned.
• Seen — the card for the emails you’ve already read.
• No New Mail — appears when all your emails have been read and sent to the Seen section.
• Shared Drafts — notifies you when your teammate invites you to create an email together or adds comments to a shared draft. Learn more about shared drafts.

Adjust the email grouping in Smart Inbox (Unread Cards)

You can choose one of the three options to group emails in the Smart Inbox (Unread Cards):

• Unified displays emails from all of your accounts together. For instance, the Personal card shows all your personal emails from every account.
• Grouped shows each email address with the number of unread messages. Tap the email address to see the new emails.
• Per Account separates each account’s emails. For example, if you receive two personal emails in two different accounts, these messages are shown on separate cards.

Choose different email groupings for different cards

For example, the Per Account setting for the Personal card, Unified for Notifications, etc.

Change the email category manually

You can manually mark a specific email as personal, notification or newsletter if Spark has sorted this email into the wrong category. For example, when you change an email category from Newsletters to Notifications, Spark will sort all future emails from this sender to the Notifications card.

Choose the card action

Switch between Inbox types