Q: iOS 10 mail...no delete all

I have two gripes about the mail in iOS 10. 

1.  No "Trash All" function.  Seriously?  What idiot decided we should only be allowed to select messages individuall?  And then, to compound it once they are selected there is still no trash button.  Instead we have to select "Move" and then select the Trash folder.  This is a monumental time waster, especially since I have to repeat the process on my iPhone.  (It's also annoying because I have to listen to my wife complain about having to do the same silly process on her iPad and iPhone.)

2.  We both also very much dislike the way the emails are now threaded, with the accompanying extra step to delete one from the thread.  At least make it a choice, rather than cramming these changes down our throats.

Found this over on osxdaily dot com, which apparently referenced a post over here somewhere... Can't take credit myself, but it totally works to mass delete.

“Go to your inbox, Tap Edit, then Mark All, and then Mark All as Read. This will then close the Edit mode.

Tap Edit again, and tap the top message in the inbox. Press and hold the Move button with your thumb.

While holding the Move button, uncheck the top message, and then release the Move button.

You will then be on a screen with a trash icon, click it and your emails are deleted.”

This is appalling!

It has to be a bug as I can't believe anyone would deliberately engineer such a user-unfriendly workflow.

I'm investigating whether I can use Outlook instead.

I wish I could go back to iOS9 because of this one thing. Such a PITA!

Fix it please.

Here is the workaround...

1. Go to your in box. Do NOT go to All inboxes.

2. If you have any unread messages, mark them all as read.. Edit -> Mark All -> Mard As Read

3. Tap Edit

4. Select the first message in the list.

5. Hold down the Move button at the bottom. Do not let go and with your other hand deselect the first message in the list.

6. Let go of the Move button.

7. You will now get a list of your mail folders including Trash. Select Trash.

8. All the messages will now be in the trash.

9. To permanently delete them go to the Trash folder then Edit -> Delete All

John

Hopefully there is a major fix in the works as this workaround is simply too many steps to accomplish something that was made a lot simpler in the past.

This  workaround is ridiculous.

Another BIG reason why I haven't upgraded any of my recent iDevices to iOS 10.

Send feedback to Apple here.

http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipad.html

Actually I misspoke. You do NOT have to mark the messages as read. So…

Assuming you only have 1 Email account…

Old method…

1. Tap Edit

4. Tap Delete All

iOS 10 method

1. Tap Edit

2. tap first message to select it

3. Hold down Move and tap first message to deselect it.

4. Tap Trash

So, if you only have 1 account you are adding 2 more taps to your delete all routine. Certainly no reason to reject the iOS 10 upgrade in my opinion.

If you have multiple email accounts, I have 4, you are adding those 2 taps to each account. Again, bfd in my opinion.

But, you know what, delete all appears to be working much better than it did before. I am no longer getting any deleted messages creeping back into my in box. And with each mail account set to empty the trash in 1 day, this process has suddenly become much easier.

BTW, I also misspoke about this workaround not working in All Inboxes. It does work, but only works well if you only have emails from a single account displayed. Otherwise, I think only the messages from the account of the first message selected are moved to the trash. The list is completely emptied so it looks like all of them are moved but after a few minutes those in the other accounts will reappear in the list.

John

Oh man, thanks!!  I was doing the too many steps way.  This is a piece of cake.  Great post.

Based on your first set of instructions, I just tried your method and it worked, but slightly different. When I released the move button, the trash text disappeared. Hmmm. Tried it again, same thing. Not knowing what to do next, I selected the inbox, and poof, just like magic no more emails.

Thank you so much for this. You have saved me countless time deleting one email at a time.

Yeap! this is the way to do it!

Thanks!

I Have hundreds of emails, mounting up, can't get rid of them. Is there any way to go back to ios9?

rwaddi wrote:

 

I Have hundreds of emails, mounting up, can't get rid of them. Is there any way to go back to ios9?

No.

Apple provided no way to revert back or install a previous iOS.

Sorry.

Have you tried trashing as described in my earlier post. Here is a slightly revised version...

1. Tap Edit

2. tap first message to select it

3. Hold down Move and tap first message to deselect it.

4. Let go of the Move button

5. Tap Trash (list of mailboxes is being displayed)

6. List of mail boxes should go away and the in box should now be empty.

7. If the list of mail boxes does not go away, you probably have more than 1 account. Click Accounts in the top left corner and select another account and click trash again.

8. Repeat step 7 until you are back in an empty in box.

Works great for me with 4 accounts. Really a piece of cake even the first tiem when I had 100s of emails to trash.

Confused, As soon as I touch the Move button, the Trash icon disappears and won't come back until I cancel Edit. So I can't follow those instructions.

OK. I think I know what you are doing. Be sure you are doing the follwoing...

1. Tap the Edit button in the upper right hand corner while you are in All inboxes or an Account Inbox.

2. Select the first email in the list by tapping it's empty circle. It should now be blue filled with a check mark.

3. With 1 hand, I use my right hand, place your index finger on the move button at the bottom of the window. DO NOT LET GO.

4. CONTINUE HODING YOUR FINGER ON THE MOVE BUTTON and with your other hand deselect the first message, the one with the blue filled circle with a check mark in it, by tapping the circle. It should now be an empty circle AND YOU SHOULD STILL HAVE YOUR FINGER ON THE MOVE BUTTON.

5. NOW... Let go of the move button.

6. As soon as you let go of the move button the message list will be replaced with a list of folders... Inbox, drafts, sent junk, trash, archive, etc.

7. Tap the trash icon.

8. If you had only messages from a single account that needed to be trashed you should now be back in your in box and it should be empty.... No Mail.

If you have more than one account and messages from more than one account were listed in the All Inboxes list of messages, then you will NOT be taken back to your inbox. The list of folders will remain, however you should have seen an icon fly into the trash when you tapped the trash icon. That means that only messages from one of your accounts were trashed. If this is the case, tap "Accounts" in the upper left hand corner and click on another of your accounts that is not greyed out and repeat step 7 for each account, ie. tapping trash, until you find yourself back where you started in your inbox or All Inboxes window and it should be empty.

John

This is all b.s.

Going to be a loooong while before I ever upgrade my iDevices to iOS 10. A loooooooog while!

If you finally get that procedure to work for you, still send feedback to Apple, please.

http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipad.html

Good Luck with all of this!