Q: How to keep email unread when selected?

I too wish Apple would just give me the option to not mark as Read!!!  Why not???

I completely agree. I've just moved to MacBook Pro and am very disappointed my email is all marked as read. If I delete one email, it automatically goes to the next email and marks it as read. FRUSTRATING!

I think I figured it out if someone has not already done so.

So with viewing pane open and you click on the first message it will mark as read.  Click on unread then press and hold down command while you select other messages that you do not want to mark as read.  They will preview in the reading pane as you click on them and they will not mark as read.

"To preview" means to preview, not to read; a message previewed simply is not read—you can't even see the whole message, so how could you read it?  You might scan part of it, but that is a preview, not a reading.  Clearly, this is a bug.

If TruePreview and another plug-in could fix this, then I'm guessing that it can be done with the terminal as well.  I cannot imagine there is no terminal command to set a (perhaps undocumented) preference for this.

If you turn the preview on you are reading the mail, if you don't want it marked as read dont read it.

Gib Henry wrote:

 

"To preview" means to preview, not to read;

It's not a "preview." It is the message, rendered and displayed in the Message Viewer.

The Preview is the 1 to 5 lines in the message list.

Clearly, this is a bug.

No, it is the way it has worked forever.

I just came across this, and would love to know how to turn off the auto marking as read even with the preview pane open.

Anyone have the trick to fix?

EDIT: I am trying to read work emails (and sometimes file them in a folder to read when I get back to the office), but don't want something to "fall through the cracks" because it gets marked as read (which means I will miss it when I open Outlook at the office).

Anyone have the trick to fix?

There isn't a "trick." The option does not exist.