10 useful keyboard shortcuts for the Mail app on Mac

Check out these must-know keyboard shortcuts for the Apple Mail app on Mac so you can streamline your workflow and speed things up.

Keyboard shortcuts for the Mail app on Mac

Using keyboard shortcuts is a great way to open in-app options, navigate, and do things quickly in any app, whether it has been preinstalled on your Mac or you’ve downloaded it yourself.

With the Mail app being the most popular way to send and receive emails on the macOS platform, it’s a great place to get started with them.

1. Mark a message as junk

If you’ve ever needed a quick way to mark a message in your inbox as junk because it wasn’t of any interest to you, don’t bother clicking any buttons. Instead, just press Command + Shift + J on your keyboard, and the message will turn gold and be marked as junk mail.

2. Add a sender to your Contacts app

Sometimes, you get new emails from people you wish you had in your Contacts app for future reference. To add a sender to your Contacts app, just press Command + Shift + Y on your keyboard, and you can begin adding the sender to your contact list.

Note: In newer versions of macOS, pressing Command + Shift + Y may open the Stickies app.

3. Refresh your email inbox

To quickly refresh your email inbox to look for new messages, press Command + Shift + N on your keyboard. When you do this, you will see “Checking for Mail” in the bottom left corner of the app, followed by “Downloading Messages” (if new messages have not been fetched).

4. Copy and paste a formatting style

If you want to copy a formatting style of one part of your email and then paste it to another part of your email, you’ll highlight the text you want to copy the formatting from by pressing Command + Shift + C on your keyboard, and then you’ll highlight the text you want to paste the formatting to by pressing Command + Shift + V on your keyboard.

5. Search your Mail app

To quickly jump to the search field to search for senders or email content, press Command + F on your keyboard.

6. Attach a file to your message

To quickly search for and attach a file to the email that you are sending, you can press Command + Shift + A from your keyboard and select a file from the accompanying interface to send.

Related: How to add an email as an attachment in Mail

7. Quickly send an email you’ve written

Instead of clicking the Send button when you’ve finished composing your email message content, you can press Command + Shift + D on your keyboard, and your message will be fired off to the recipient.

If you think you made a mistake or changed your mind, use the Undo Send button in the bottom left.

 8. Print the contents of an email

At times, you might need to print the contents of an email, which is handy for receipts and letters that you receive. To print out an email quickly from the Mail app, press Command + P on your keyboard, select a printer from the pop-up, and click on the “Print” button.

Related: How to print or save an email from the Gmail app or website as a PDF

9. Make the Mail app full-screen

To make the Mail app full-screen for even more viewing pleasure, press Control + Command + F on your keyboard. Use the same shortcut to exit the full screen.

10. Quickly delete all junk mail

Instead of deleting the junk mail all by yourself, you can press Command + Option + J on your keyboard and confirm. After this, all junk mail will be cleared from your Mail app so you can focus on the important emails.

Related: How to automatically delete junk emails in Mail on Mac

These aren’t the only Mac Mail keyboard shortcuts available to use, but they are some of the most useful, in my opinion. All of them can help you to improve your speed and efficiency while composing multiple emails each day. For more, click the menu option in the top menu bar and note the shortcut name next to an option.

Do more with Mail: