Select several emails to archive, delete, move or mark them as read in one go. On desktop, click the circle at the start of a row; on your phone, touch and hold an email and tap Select.
Steps
Desktop
Hover over an email in the list and click the circle at the left of the row.
Click more emails to add them to the selection.
Use the bar at the top of the list: Mark as read (or Mark as unread), Move to, Archive or Trash.
To cancel, press Esc or click ✕ in the bar.
You can also select from the keyboard:
Key
What it does
Space
Select or deselect the highlighted email
Shift+↓ or Shift+↑
Add the next or previous email
⌘A (Ctrl+A on Windows and Linux)
Select all
*
Select all, or clear the selection
While emails are selected, U, M, E and # act on all of them, and right-clicking opens a menu for the whole selection.
iPhone, iPad & Android
Touch and hold an email, then tap Select.
Tap more emails to add them, or tap Select all at the top.
Use the bar at the bottom to archive, move to Trash, mark as read or unread, or move to a label.
To finish, tap ✕ at the top left.
Good to know
You can't select emails in search results or in Recap. On a phone, you also can't select in Drafts.
On a phone, moving to a label works only when all the selected emails come from the same account.
One undo reverses the whole batch: press Z on desktop, or tap Undo on your phone.
On a phone, starring, snoozing and marking as spam work on one email at a time.