Downloading Emails From Gmail Explained

Keeping a record of email notifications and messages is very important, especially if you are a business owner and most of your communication is through electronic channels. Data management experts recommend that if you download emails from Gmail, you can archive most threads of your business conversations and share them as attachments for future reference.

Downloading emails can be beneficial in tracking company emails and storing important business communication data to share later. Specific messages and letters can be forwarded as attachments in Gmail or other communication applications when properly downloaded.

Let's explore the benefits you can take advantage of when downloading emails from Gmail.

Benefits of downloading emails from Gmail

There are many advantages to downloading emails from your Gmail account. Below are some of the most important ones.

Freeing up space

As a free Gmail account holder, you are allotted 15 GB of free space on Google Cloud. All your emails and conversion threads will be stored here. If you run out of space when you use up your free allotment, you'll need to pull your emails from Gmail to free up some space.

Overflowing your email account will affect performance and capacity and you will have trouble finding specific email messages. Going through a stream of archives of old messages in search of a particular thread seems to be a tedious task indeed. Therefore, downloading emails as .pdf or .eml files will allow you to improve account performance and also free up allocated space.

Using your hard drive space to download and organize emails from the cloud will help you keep track of important messages and also organize them chronologically.

Securely store detailed information

Storing important details and keeping a record of important business meetings is another noticeable advantage of downloading emails to your computer.

Storing email messages and other chat information helps preserve evidence for later use. Storing emails on a computer increases protection and allows for easy organization of the information contained in the emails. This information can be used for company meetings, preparing and creating PowerPoint templates for company letters, business presentations creating with PowerPoint presentation services.

Easy sharing

If your business partners and co-workers don't use a Gmail account, you can download emails from Gmail as attachments and share them with them. You can share emails as .PSF attachments or through open cloud sharing services available online.

Saving emails and sharing them improves the accessibility of messages to a wider audience. You can share entire threads of conversations and virtual meeting records, as well as a collection of company emails to multiple people at once.

Common ways to download emails

Even though Google is the largest email service in the world, there is still the possibility of loss or error, and you could lose your email data if it's stored incorrectly. By downloading your emails from Gmail, you can protect them from sudden loss in the event of a hacker or malware attack. The download process can take just a few minutes. Here are some common methods of downloading emails from Gmail. Let's take a look at them.

1. Downloading an entire thread or a single email

You can download individual emails or an entire email thread from your Gmail account to your device by following a few simple steps:

  • Log in to your Gmail account from your device.
  • Select the folder from which you want to download the email or email thread. For example, the Spam folder.
  • Click on the email you want to download and press the button to open it.
  • Click on the three vertical dots present in the top right corner of the email. This button opens a drop-down menu containing the email options.
  • To download an email from your Gmail account to your device, select the "Download Message" option.
  • A dialogue box will then appear asking for the path to the selected folder.
  • Select the destination folder where the email will be saved as an .eml file or a web page file.
  • Press the "Save" button..

2. Downloading email attachments

For reference, you may want to download email attachments from Gmail. If the file is smaller than 25 MB, you can preview the email before downloading it.

  • Log in to your Gmail account from your device.
  • Open the thread of the email you want to download that contains attachments.
  • Find the attachments you want to download and click the down arrow to start the direct download.
  • A prompt window will inform you when the download has started and the file path where the downloaded file will be saved.

3. Download the email as a .pdf file

You can also download emails from your Gmail account as a .pdf file. Since .pdf files are supported by most word processing and communication applications. In addition, the portable document format takes up less space than .eml files. The procedure for downloading an email in .pdf format is as follows:

  • Log in to your Google mail account from your computer or portable device.
  • Locate the folder where the target email message is located.
  • Click the "Print" button at the top.
  • Select "PDF" from the printer options menu.

  • In the Print window, select "Change".
  • Select a destination to save the file. The device directories for saving will be displayed.
  • In the file destination window, click "Save as PDF".

  • Press the "OK" button to complete the saving process.

How to download emails from Gmail in 6 steps?

Step 1

In your web browser, go to the Google Takeout link (takeout.google.com).

Step 2

In the top right corner, click "Deselect All".

Step 3

When you scroll down the page, the "Mail" option will appear. Check the box on the right hand side and select this option.

Step 4

You will now see the option "All mail data". Select it.

Step 5

From this point on, you should decide whether you want to include all mail or specific labels.

Step 6

Click on "Next Step" to get to the delivery method and you will be able to select the file type to save the exported emails.

How to select the delivery method for downloaded emails?

There are several delivery method options available when downloading emails from Gmail. These options include:

Once you see these options, it's clear that the choice is doable and that you can easily choose the method that works best for you.

Below is a brief overview of the three most common of these methods and what to do with them once you've chosen one.

1. Sending the download link by email

Step 1

Once you have a list of delivery methods open in front of you, select the "Send download link via email" option.

Step 2

Click on the "Create Export" button.

Step 3

You will now see a message mentioning the archiving option. Click on the "Download Archive" button.

Step 4

Complete the process of saving the data.

2. Adding to Google Drive

Step 1

Once you have a list of delivery methods open in front of you, select "Add to Google Drive".

Step 2

Click on the "Create Export" option.

Step 3

Once you receive the email, select "View on Drive". A folder will appear with the organized email data.

Step 4

Click on "Download" to access them.

3. Adding to Dropbox

Step 1

Once you have a list of delivery methods open in front of you, select "Add to Dropbox".

Step 2

Click on the "Link accounts and create export" button.

Step 3

You will be redirected to your Dropbox account. Log in to your account.

Step 4

Once logged in, a window will appear asking for access permissions. Select "Allow" to allow Google access to your Dropbox folder.

Step 5

Once displayed, you will receive an email that will redirect you to Dropbox. This will take you to the Dropbox folder containing your data.

Step 6

Simply follow the instructions provided to download your data.

How many export types do you encounter when downloading emails from Gmail?

Once you decide to download emails from Gmail, you may encounter two types of exports. These are explained below.

One-time Export

This type of export helps to create a separate archive of the selected data. If you were planning to leave your account or cancel it permanently, this is the best option for one-time use. This often happens when you change email services or when a company employee has quit and the data needs to be archived once and for all.

Scheduled Export

This type of export is more systematic and time-limited. It is set up to automatically process according to a selected schedule so that data can be exported as a regular backup in a timely manner. For example, twice a month, monthly or annually. However, each year the export schedule needs to be re-set.

What are the available file types for downloading emails from Gmail?

  • Zip files - This is the most convenient option supported by most devices.
  • Tgz files - These files may require special software to open.

How do I select certain labels from Gmail for bulk downloads?

To download specific labels from Gmail, follow the steps below.

Step 1

After you sign in to your Gmail account, open the Google Downloads page in your browser.

Step 2

Scroll down the page until you see the Mail section.

Step 3

Click "Including all mail". The page will open as shown below.

Step 4

Select the selected labels and check the boxes.

Step 5

After selecting them, click on the "OK" button.

Then select the delivery method and follow the procedure regarding the selected method as described above.

Gmail email download FAQs

How do I save email messages from my Google Mail account to my device?

When your email data exceeds the 15GB limit, downloading emails becomes a real possibility. You can store emails on secondary storage devices, such as your local hard drive.

While there are multiple ways to do this, here are the most common ones. With this method, however, you can download emails from Gmail one at a time. This option may allow you to save the message to your computer, while keeping the format and attachments.

Just log in to your Gmail account and select the email message you want to save. Tap Next and select Download message. Then save it to the selected folder on your computer.

How can I handle a large mailing list?

One of the effective ways to handle a large mailing list with a of emails is by PDF mail merger. A mail merge PDF will do so by automating the process of customizing and sending mail along with individual PDFs. This method will save a lot of your time and effort as compered to the manual process of handling large mailing lists.

How do I download and save Gmail emails to an external storage device?

Downloading your emails to an external hard drive is an easy process as described in the above article. Go to the takeout.google.com link. Select the "send download link via email" option, i.e. your chosen delivery method.

Then select the "create archive" button. Once the data archive is ready in the mail, you will receive a message and can click on the download option to save the archived data to an external or local drive.

You can also choose a simpler procedure and download and save the emails as .PDF files one by one as shown above.

Can I download Gmail emails with attachments?

Most methods describing downloading Gmail emails do not explicitly explain downloading with attachments. However, you can export a single email with attachments from Gmail to Google Drive. Open the selected email and click the "Save to Google Drive" button.

After selecting the Google Drive folder, press the Save button. You have various options in the save settings. You can choose to save only attachments, or merge conversations into one file, or save each conversation into a separate file.

Some third-party email services even offer an auto-forwarding option that allows you to export and create automatic backups of your emails.

How can I save email messages as an archive before deleting them?

To save email messages as an archive before deleting them, select the email and right-click to open the email options. Then select the Archive button. You can choose to save them to a cloud application such as Dropbox, one drive or Google docs.

What could be the reason for downloading emails from Gmail and why is this a recommended practice?

You may have certain reasons for downloading emails from Gmail. It could be because of a job change, when you want to clean up your online mailbox and export old data to an archive folder. Or you may want to protect your data from pirates or hackers. Or it may be because a member of your team is leaving and you want to archive unimportant message threads. Or it may be because a new employee needs to keep track of the entire project discussion, so you want to share messages, etc.

Can I save emails with the same labels and folders after downloading?

Yes, you can keep the labels. However, you must save each one separately. To download the labels, download the MBOX files for the labels and import them into the destination folders.