Mail app opens hundreds of old emails on startup -- how to fix?

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Mail app opens hundreds of old emails on startup -- how to fix?

I haven't used Mail as my default email application in years. Every time it opens automatically, it also opens hundreds and hundreds of old emails. It then freezes from the overload and I have to force quit.

I'd like to be able to use the app but I need to clear all those old emails (including hundreds of calendar alerts, apparently). How can I do this? I just upgraded to a brand new Macbook Pro running OS Monterey.

MacBook Pro 15″, OS X 10.10

Posted on Jan 17, 2022 9:08 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,464 points

Jan 20, 2022 5:39 AM in response to zschaeffer

If it is functional, but slow, try cmd-opt-w.

That should close all windows. It will close the message viewer window, you can open that up from the Window menu.

Clearing the saved state should have stopped those from opening, too.

I don't know why it would open all of those windows.

The outbox.mbox folder would be in an account folder in your user Library/Mail/V9/ folder. (~/Library/Mail/V9)

The account folders have a unique id for name, so you have to just open each and see what is inside. If there is an Outbox.mbox, you could try deleting that. Once you do that, go up one folder and open MailData. Delete all of the Envelop Index files.

Open Mail.

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Answer 2

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,464 points

Jan 19, 2022 2:40 PM in response to zschaeffer

Try it without the escaped spaces. After pasting, wait a few seconds to see if a path of folders shows up. It seems to take a while to search for the path. I didn't notice the delay, before.

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.mail/Data/Library/Saved Application State/

You should see a folder named,

com.apple.mail.savedState

Delete that folder.

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Answer 3

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,464 points

Jan 17, 2022 9:20 AM in response to zschaeffer

Open your user Library/Saved Application State/ delete the com.apple.mail.savedState file.

If not set to view your user Library, hold down the Option key and select Library from the Go menu in Finder.

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Answer 4

zschaeffer Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 17, 2022 9:28 AM in response to Barney-15E

You've gotten me hopeful but I can't find a "saved application state" folder and searching for "com.apple.mail.savedState" doesn't yield anything... could you give a little more info?

(As an aside, I now can't open Mail at all. It immediately goes into "not responding" mode when I try to open)

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Answer 5

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,464 points

Jan 17, 2022 11:38 AM in response to zschaeffer

Did you hold down the Option key and select Library from the Go menu in Finder?

The folder is actually an alias to a folder in Mail's container.

Try using Go to Folder (cmd-shift-g) and paste in this path:

~/Library/Containers/com.apple.mail/Data/Library/Saved\ Application\ State/com.apple.mail.savedState

That should open a window to that folder.

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Answer 6

Barney-15E

Level 10

116,464 points

Jan 17, 2022 4:19 PM in response to zschaeffer

I didn't tell you to open a folder and type that path.

I told you to use Go To Folder from the Go Menu in Finder, or use the shortcut (cmd-shift-g).

I guess I could have specifically told you to go to the Go menu, but I figured you would just type the shortcut.

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Answer 7

zschaeffer Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 20, 2022 5:16 AM in response to Barney-15E

Thank you, that helped. Now that those are cleared, Mail opens all 716 emails that were in my Outbox and works so slowly I can't delete them from inside the app (it didn't know which server to use so they are all stored; trying to select the correct server only clears them one by one). Is there also a folder for outbox messages I can delete?

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