Getting started with Notion Mail

Email hasn't changed much since the early 2000s, but the way we work sure has. These days, everything flows through our inbox— from closing deals and helping customers to setting up meetings (not to mention lots and lots of junk). But traditional inboxes just weren't built for modern work. They get cluttered fast and eat up time with manual tasks that could be spent on what matters.

That's where Notion Mail comes in. We've reimagined email from the ground up to create an inbox that works the way you do— bringing together Notion's flexibility with powerful AI. Whether you want to hit inbox zero, build better customer relationships, or put those repetitive tasks on autopilot, we've got the tools to make email work for you.

In this guide, you’ll learn how to—

• Organize your inbox however you want— Let Notion AI handle the busywork of managing your inbox. Tell it what matters to you, and it'll automatically sort your emails so the right messages float to the top.

• Personalize your inbox to your work— Set up custom views that reflect how you work best, whether you like to sort by urgency, sender, or any other priority.

• Create reusable responses with snippets— Save your go-to responses as snippets and let Notion AI help craft thoughtful replies, so you can focus on your most valuable work.

• Use built-in scheduling— Set up meetings directly from your inbox, eliminating the ping-pong of finding the perfect time between multiple tools.

Managing a busy inbox can be challenging. While traditional email tools rely on simple labels and folders, today's work needs a smarter approach. With Notion Mail, you can organize your inbox in a way that helps you focus on what matters most.

For example, if you manage a startup, you might want your inbox to show investor emails first— saving you from digging through less urgent messages. With views, you can quickly spot what needs your attention. Here’s how:

Filters help you cut through the clutter and focus on what matters. Navigate to the top right of your inbox to access the filter icon. You'll find familiar options like "read" and "unread," plus some favorites from Notion databases like the "select" property for custom tags. Looking for calendar invites? There's a filter for that too! You can mix and match filters to organize your inbox exactly how you need it.

Using the Group by option takes organization even further by providing common ways to structure your inbox. You can group emails by domain or sender — perfect for keeping track of messages from key clients or stakeholders. You can also group by priority, which is ideal if you use your inbox as a task list. You can also customize priority tags however you want.

After playing with groups and filters, save your favorite setups as views to quickly get the inbox snapshot you need.

Now that you’re familiar with groups and filters, it's time to save your setup as a customized view. To get started, click the + option under Views in the left sidebar to create a new view. You can either start from scratch or pick from our pre-built templates.

Here are three powerful views that'll help you stay on top of what matters most:

• Prioritize based on contacts— Being available and responsive to people who impact your work the most is often the top priority. Let's say you're a founder who needs to stay on top of partner emails. You can quickly set up a view by grouping emails by sender or domain, add your key partner, and just like that, you have a dedicated space to track all their messages.

• Categorize based on urgency — If you deal with lots of emails as a sales professional, you'll want an easy way to track important leads. Create a new view using the "sales" template to automatically organize emails from key domains related to potential deals. You can then add additional tags to quickly identify which messages need urgent attention and which can wait.

• Organize based on action items— If your inbox doubles as your task list (like many project managers), you'll love our priority-based views. Once you start tagging your emails (more on that later), they'll automatically sort into an easy-to-follow task list that clearly distinguishes urgent messages from non-urgent ones.

Whether you choose to create a customized view from scratch or use one of our pre-built view templates, you can tweak them until they’re perfect for your workflow. Since everything saves automatically and you can create unlimited views, don't hesitate to set up as many as you need!

Your inbox should be smarter and free of little annoyances, like manually labeling emails. Notion Mail is powered by AI to automatically do the heavy lifting for you. Look for the auto label button in the top right corner of your inbox. Tell Notion AI what matters to you, and it'll handle your email sorting — no more manual work needed. It learns your preferences and tags incoming emails just the way you want them, freeing up time for what really counts.

Here are three ways you can ask Notion AI to label your incoming emails:

• Label emails from specific domains— Say you frequently receive automated emails from delivery services, subscription notifications, and other services that you'd rather keep organized but out of focus. You can tell Notion AI to spot these domains and label them for you automatically.

• Tag emails from specific people— Want to make sure you never miss an email from your boss or leadership team? Just tell Notion AI who's important to you, and it'll automatically flag these emails in a dedicated view. You can even group them by priority to stay extra organized. So when your Product lead sends you an urgent update, you'll know right away.

• Tag emails with specific phrases— You can ask Notion to tag all emails containing action words like "Action Required," "Urgent," "Important," "Needs reply," or "To do"

In just a few quick prompts, watch as your inbox organizes itself using Notion AI. Let it handle the routine tasks while you tackle what truly moves your work forward.

Writing emails can sometimes feel like a chore. Coming up with the right words, getting the tone correct , and making sure everything's clear– it takes time and energy. With Notion Mail, you can use Notion's powerful AI writer as your writing companion. Whether you're sending a quick update or crafting a detailed proposal, it helps you write with clarity and confidence, making the whole process feel effortless.

Imagine you're managing recruitment and receiving numerous job applications daily. You might get emails asking about open roles or checking on application status. While you want to reply quickly, the volume can be overwhelming. Plus, you notice you're writing similar responses over and over. Here's how Notion AI's writer can help streamline your workflow—

• Choose from suggestions—When you open an email, Notion AI suggests helpful prompts to help you respond faster. For example, when a candidate asks about their application status, you can select from pre-written quick replies.

• Edit your content like you would in Notion— Using the familiar Notion experience, customize your response with titles, highlighted text, colored fonts, and attachments. Access these features using the / command. Check out our reference article for more details.

• Craft a beautiful response— When you receive a unique question about your company, let Notion AI draft a response instead of starting from scratch. You can even enhance your reply by "@" referencing your company wiki (link to a Notion page) or style guide to ensure consistency.

• Save everything as snippets— When you craft a response you love, save it as a snippet to reuse later. Simply click the {} icon in the bottom right of your composer, select + New snippet, add a title and content, then hit save.

As a busy professional, you probably spend a lot of time scheduling meetings and calls. Rather than jumping between different scheduling tools, you can now handle everything directly in your inbox. Thanks to Notion Mail's integration with Notion Calendar, you can quickly set up meetings while keeping your schedule in view. Our new smart scheduling button makes this process seamless. Here's how:

• In your composer, click the calendar icon in the bottom right corner

• Drag your mouse to select the time blocks when you're available

• Click outside the box to automatically generate a Schedule here link

• Include this link in your email message. When recipients click it, they'll see a simple calendar interface to schedule the meeting

Your email workflow can finally adapt to the way you work, whether its easy scheduling or snippets so you don’t ever write the same email twice.

Our goal is simple—turn email from something stressful into a tool that helps you focus on what matters. Just as we've reimagined every other aspect of modern work, we’ve reinvented your email experience to be smarter, faster, and more aligned with how you actually work. Because when your inbox works with you, not against you, there's no limit to what you can accomplish.