Tips

Anyone with an email account knows the Information Age has one big drawback: Too much information.

Remember when your email was only filled with messages from people you actually knew? Those were the days. But it didn’t take long for that inbox to fill up with useless updates, unwanted offers and mass-mailed spam from every service you ever gave your address to (and probably several you didn’t).

Some of us spend a good chunk of the day just deleting spam or clicking through “unsubscribe” links, and that’s the “Type-A” personalities. Most of us simply watch that inbox counter tick over into the triple and quadruple digits, feeling helpless against the deluge.

That’s why we love Clean Email. It essentially functions as a butler and bouncer for your email, keeping the virtual house in order and the clutter well outside.

How does it work?

Among other things, the service employs a series of intuitive filters called Smart Views to let you organize your messages into groups.

You can then search those emails by narrowing down the criteria — say, all emails from a certain address sent before a certain date or those with attachments above a particular size. From there, you can quickly trim things down by deleting or labeling your emails en masse.

Those labels you apply will help keep things tidy. You can define certain senders as important, and view those on the fly. Others — say, those from coworkers or a specified domain — can be filed into predetermined folders automatically, to be viewed when you need them.

With these filters, Clean Email can do more than just organize. With a simple click, you can trash, block or simply delete emails you don’t want to receive. No more going through the trouble of unsubscribing and hoping the offending party actually follows through.

With all this control, you can confidently open your personal inbox without being afraid of the contents. Your work email can become a communication resource again instead of a time sink.

The app is compatible with Gmail, Yahoo and other major providers. There are a variety of plans available, but a lifetime subscription to Clean Email is currently on sale for more than 95% off the full cost, only $29.99. Pick it up now, and start making your email work for you again.