Notion, the makers behind the super-personalized, all-you-can-DIY note-taking suite, is launching another option for managing your inbox. It’s called Notion Mail, and while it’s been in a sort-of beta for months, it’s officially available today for the Mac and web browser, and so far, so very good.
Notion Mail was announced last fall with the beta. We had an inkling it was coming after Notion acquired another email app called Skiff in February 2024, which had privacy and security at the forefront. (Notion Mail says it’s SOC2 certified and HIPAA compliant.) This is also how Notion’s second app, Notion Calendar, came to be, (after the acquisition of the calendar app Cron in early 2024).
Notion Mail seems more focused on touting its ability to untangle the mess that is email. From the get-go, the app bills itself as “the inbox that organizes itself,” which sounds promising to someone like me who desperately seeks help via a third-party entity. Notion Mail uses AI tricks to help you get started toward the path of inbox liberation. Its marquee feature lets you describe what you’re attempting to organize rather than asking you to set up a formulaic rule.
My inbox is still a damn mess, but I’ve already been able to organize like Substack newsletters and updates from my kid’s school district into individual bookmarks using Notion Mail’s AI-based auto labeler. All I had to do was describe the content I was looking to have grouped, though I had to be specific if I wanted more than one email address or source to be included in the label. For instance, when I set out to make the label for my child’s school, I used “school notifications and emails from Class Dojo and my child’s teacher, [teacher’s name]”. When I just used “school notifications,” it fetched me only the emails that specifically mentioned the elementary school.
Notion Mail immediately organized all my Substack spam.
Notion Mail is free to use, but it’s limited to Gmail right now. There’s also only an app for the Mac, with the company promising Notion Mail will have an iOS app coming soon and an Android one later this year. You can use the app to manage multiple emails, but only if they’re Google accounts. Andrew Milich, one of the founders of Skiff and now at Notion Mail, couldn’t offer a date to The Verge for Outlook and other account support.
Other special features of Notion Mail include custom views, a built-in meeting scheduler, and the tried-and-true Notion writing environment. I’m barely two hours into using this email suite and still figuring out how to add sources after making labels. But if I can get a clearer view of what’s happening in my Gmail, it may make Notion Mail another app I integrate into my workflow.
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