As we are using Gmail since ages and we all have received a lot of emails since years finding them is always a task but gmail is very advance it has some hidden attributes and features which if used properly it can help us if used properly.
So let me give you all the example where gmail helps you to provide narrow down the search results of your search criteria.
The search syntax is operator:search_keyword. For instance, you could say from:itedvantage.com
to find all emails where the sender in ITEdvantage. Use the logical boolean search operators to specify multiple search operators (e.g., from:ITEdvantage OR subject:invoice).
Search Criteria | Gmail Search Query |
---|---|
Emails that are either starred or unread | is:unread OR is:starred |
Emails with specific recipients in the To or Cc fields | to:hemant OR cc:ronak |
Emails received during a specific time period | after:2020/01/01 before:2020/04/14 |
Search for messages older or newer than a time period | older_than:7d (for 7 days) newer_than:2m (for 2 months) older_than: 2y (for 2 years) |
Search Gmail by size | larger:10M (for emails larger than 10 MB) smaller:1M (for emails small than 1 MB) |
Email messages that are in a particular email folder (or label). | in:label_name label:label_name label:personal-emails in:anywhere (message anywhere in Gmail) |
Find emails that have particular words in the subject line | subject:invoice subject:(invoice OR receipt) subject:“payment received” |
Find messages that contain particular words | Payment OR Purchase Order (either words) Payment AND Purchase Order (contain both words) (Payment Purchase Order) (contain both words) “Payment Purchase Order” (exact phrase) |
Find emails that have an attachments | has:attachments filename:pdf (search attachments by type) filename:emails.csv (search by file name) |
Search for messages delivered to a particular email address | deliveredto:info@techinfinity.io |
Emails where my email is either in CC or BCC | cc:me OR bcc:me |
Emails that do not contain a specific word | -cats |
Find emails messages in trash or spam | label:spam OR label:trash |
Find emails anywhere but in spam or trash | in:anywhere |
Find emails that contain links to Google Drive or Google Slides or YouTube | has:youtube OR has:drive OR has:presentation |

Things to note
- Search for an exact phrase by enclosing the phrase inside double-quotes. Capitalization is ignored.
- You can use logical operators like AND, NOT or OR to refine your search and they must always be typed in uppercase letters.
- Search for email messages by date using the before: and after: search operators. The date format is yyyy/mm/dd (e.g., 2017/07/15)
- You cannot use the bcc: operator to find emails in which you were blind carbon copied.
- If the label name in Gmail includes a space (e.g., Office Expenses), use a dash in the query when searching for emails inside that label (e.g. label:office-expenses)
If you think you have more than share it in comment it will be added in the list with proper credits and links will be provided to the original source site.
Gmail is been used by everyone but it has a lot of search operators. So try reading once everything on Basic Gmail Search Operators with ITEdvantage.