Search by age

How it works

older_than: and newer_than: take a number followed by a unit: d for days, m for months, y for years. newer_than:2d means "less than two days old".

Examples

• older_than:1yOpen in Gmail ↗

  Messages more than a year old.

• newer_than:2dOpen in Gmail ↗

  Messages less than two days old.

• has:attachment older_than:6mOpen in Gmail ↗

  Messages with an attachment more than six months old.

What it does well

• A relative duration rather than a fixed date: "older than 6 months" stays true tomorrow, with no edit to the query.
• Quicker to type than a full date when cleaning up (old mail, old attachments).

What it does badly

• Only three units are documented: d, m, y. The help page mentions neither hours nor weeks.Documented by Google · Gmail Help: search operators

See also

• after:before:Finds messages received after or before a specific date.
• has:Finds messages containing an attachment, a YouTube video, a Drive file or a Google document.
• size:larger:smaller:Finds messages of a given size, larger or smaller than a threshold.

Search examples that use it

• Find emails with an attachment older than 6 monthshas:attachment older_than:6m
• Isolate promotions and newsletterscategory:promotions older_than:1y