Everything new in Mail for macOS Catalina

We got a lot of news about future updates from Apple on Monday. One of the big-ticket items was macOS Catalina, the new operating software coming to your Mac this Fall. Today we’re going to zoom in on macOS Catalina to look at new features in Mail.

Mail has never been Apple’s most exciting app. And for years it’s lagged behind third-party alternatives like Spark or PolyMail. 

But all that seems to be changing because Apple introduced three exciting features to Mail in macOS Catalina.

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1. Block sender

Keep getting chain emails or spam from your weird Uncle Gary? Well, now you can just block him and everything he sends you goes straight to the trash.

The ability to block a sender in Mail is going to be an invaluable tool for keeping your inbox neat and tidy. Use it as a weapon against phishing, spam, or even cyber-bullying.

And in classic Apple style, it’s easy to use. Just click the sender’s name in any email header and then click Block. 

Boom! All done.

2. Mute Thread

If you ever got added to one of those enormous email threads with 100+ contacts, you know how frustrating email notifications can get. Everybody keeps using Reply All with nothing valuable to add and your emails go off every 30 seconds.

Yeah, they’re often hilarious! But it’s impossible to focus on your what you’re doing!

That’s where Mute Thread comes in. This new feature for Mail in macOS Catalina lets you turn off notifications for a particular email thread. 

You can still see all the messages in your inbox when you need to. But you won’t get notified every time a new one comes in.

Ahh, blissful silence.

3. Unsubscribe

And last but not least: Unsubscribe. This new Mail feature makes it easier than ever to unsubscribe from mailing lists and newsletters you don’t want anymore. Or never signed up to in the first place…

When you get an email from a commercial list, Mail in macOS Catalina shows an Unsubscribe button above the email header. Just click that without needing to search through the email for a link in the small print.

With these three features combined, it should be easier than ever to trim down your email notifications each day and keep that inbox neat and tidy. 

All that with a new layout to boot

Not only can you block, mute, and unsubscribe with ease, but you’ll enjoy Mail’s new layout at the same time.

Apple has revamped Mail to have a column layout in macOS Catalina, with a preview of your currently selected message on the right side. This should make it easier than ever to navigate your inbox and view its contents at a glance.

None of these updates are groundbreaking, and they’re all relatively small changes to Mail. But together they should make a noticeable difference to feeling on top of your emails.

And we hope they’re a sign of things to come for the future updates as well.

Find out what else is new in macOS Catalina. And let us know your thoughts on WWDC 2019 in the comments!

Dan Helyer( Senior Writer )

Dan is a freelance writer based in South West England.

He spent two years supervising repairs as a Genius Admin for Apple Retail and uses that knowledge to keep our troubleshooting guides up to date.

Long before that, Dan turned to Apple products from a musical background. Having owned iPods for years, he bought a MacBook to learn sound recording and production. It was using those skills that he gained a first-class Bachelor of Science in Sound Technology.