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July 14, 2007

Quickly Delete Email On The iPhone

There are 2 ways to delete email on the iPhone. The slow way, and the not-so-secret, yet sort of secret, quick way.

Here's the slow and obvious way. When you're inside an inbox looking at a list of messages, hit the 'EDIT' button on the top right of the iPhone's screen, then push the 'red minus circle' button next to an individual email, then push the 'DELETE' button that appears after pushing the minus button. This method works well, and if you have all day to delete emails, we think it's the way to go.

If, however, you only have a couple of minutes for deleting email, there's a crafty way that's also faster. Simply slide your finger from left to right across the specific message you want to erase and the 'DELETE' button will appear. This magic finger-stroke allows you to erase a long list of junk mail without entering the edit mode and pushing the minus button. That's two button pushes you can save for your next elevator trip.

PS The swipe trick will also work in the 'VIDEOS' list on your iPhone's iPod. (Don't even bother swiping at other iPhone apps, the interns at iphonePOV spent the afternoon swiping at everything that looks deletable, and the trick only works for emails and videos.)

UPDATE 1: An anonymous tipster was kind enough to point out that the swipe-a-roo can also delete iPhone SMS chats. Coincidentally, iphonePOV is now looking for some new interns.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Actually, it also works for SMS chats.

Editor said...

Hmmm... It seems you're right. Looks like we need some new interns.

k said...

It's not *that* much faster. If you go into edit mode, you hit the minus with one thumb and delete with the other, it's a quick back-and-forth thing. With the swipe, I find that you:

a) Have to swipe just right or you'll open the email, losing a lot of time in deleting, and

b) it's still two moves (swipe, hit delete), but the first way is tap tap and the second way is a longer swipe tap.

So not much savings in time, in my opinion.

I'm still waiting for a "delete all" and "empty trash." It stinks not having those basic features.

alscommander said...

Does anyone know how to delete email off iPhone but retain on computer?

Cliff said...

Is there a way to quickly delete email? Both common methods are very slow if you have over 4 messages to delete.

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Anonymous said...

'Delete All' is simples....Simply hit edit...select one of the emails...then press and hold move...at the same time untick the previous email you selected. Release the move button.
You will then see all your emails have been selected to move into trash. Boom!!