Opera Mail Tutorial

Handle received messages

When new messages are received, Opera Mail does most of the work for you, so you spend less time organizing your messages. This makes Opera Mail different to more traditional email clients.

In this topic:

How is Opera Mail different?

Traditional email clientOpera Mail
Uses folders (filing cabinets)Uses views and labels
Messages stored in foldersMessages stored in central location
Messages moved to foldersMessages displayed in views and labels
Messages sent to InboxMessages automatically sorted into views and labels
Messages remain in Inbox until movedMessages in Unread view until read
Slow searchesFast searches due to indexed storage

What this means is that, instead of being delivered into the one inbox, messages are kept in a single database and automatically indexed without fuss. It doesn't organize by folders but by searches and tags (views and labels). Opera Mail also filters out junk mail (spam), and you can train it based on your preferences.

As messages are kept in a single database they can therefore appear in multiple categories or views without you needing to copy or move them.

As a summary:

Use Mail views

Before we starting looking at reading individual messages, let's take a closer look at how to use Mail views.

The headers for all categories and views are in the Mail panel to the left. When you click one, the message list and selected message displays. The name of the active view displays in the tab. For example, if you are in the Unread view, the name displayed in the tab is Unread with the corresponding number of messages in brackets, as shown in (1) below.

Mail window
  1. Active view name
  2. Message list
  3. Selected message display
  4. Toolbar

Message list display

Once you've selected a view, messages for that view are displayed in a split window by default, with a list of messages to the left, and the content of a selected message to the right, by default. You can change how messages are sorted, and the messages you want displayed. See more: Change individual view lists

For IMAP messages, Opera Mail downloads only headers (the subject line and some information about the message) when checking for new messages, by default. When you select a message header, Opera Mail retrieves the message body, including any attachments when you are online. To read your IMAP messages offline, see Use Opera Mail offline.

Message list information

The message list provides the following information for each message:

IndicatorDescription
Message color In the message list, coloured text indicates status:
  • Bold text in blue indicates unseen messages that have not been selected or viewed in Opera Mail.
  • Bold text in black indicates unread messages; previously viewed but not marked as read.
  • Plain text indicates messages marked as read.
Subject The subject header of the email. A plus symbol (+) shows that the message belongs to a thread. Click to collapse or expand the thread.
From (sender) or To (recipient in Sent view) The name of the sender or recipient.
Sent date date the email was received or sent.
Attachment icon (paperclip) A paperclip icon is used to indicate a file attachment. Messages with attachments are also shown under the Attachments category with specific icons to indicate the type. For details, see Default categories that display when needed.
Label icon If a label has been applied, the corresponding icon displays. See more: Sort messages using labels

View a message

To view a message:

  1. Select the relevant view to display the message list.
  2. Select a message and either:
    • Scroll through the content in the message content pane below, or
    • Double-click the message to display it in a new browser tab.

Mark messages as read

New messages are initially considered unseen and change to Unread once selected. Messages do not change from unread until marked as read. There are a few quick ways to mark messages as read, listed in the table below:

If you want to ... Then ...
Mark a single message as read Highlight the message and click the Read button on the Mail toolbar, or press K.
Mark all messages in a view as read Right-click the view header in the Mail panel and select Mark all as read, or press Ctrl+Shift+A.
Re-set a read message to unread Right-click the message and select Mark > Mark as unread, or press Shift+K.
Automatically mark messages as read Go to the Default Mail Settings icon -- marked with a wrench symbol -- at the top-right of the message display and select Mark as read and select a time interval.

Pin a message

You can pin a message to remind you to act on it. Pinned messages display in a separate Pinned view to help you keep track of them. You can pin a message in the following ways:

Pin icon

Pinning is mapped to the IMAP \Flagged feature, so this will sync with “starring” or “flagging” in other IMAP clients, such as Gmail. To unpin, click the dot or icon again.

With IMAP, changes such as marking messages as read, or moving messages offline, are reflected when you next connect to the mail server.

Open or save an attachment

Emails with attachments display in both the Received and Attachments views. Under the Attachments view header, messages with attachments are sorted into views by type:

When you open an email with an attachment, select the attachment to display a context menu of options, including Open and different save options.

The Attachments view only displays emails with images attached, not those displayed as part of the email (inline images). To save an inline image, right-click the image and select Save image.

View and manage threads

Threads are ordered lists of related messages that allow you to follow an email discussion. If you receive a lot of threaded messages, following threads makes it easy to recognize important messages, while ignoring threads makes it easy to dismiss unimportant ones. Messages are threaded by default.

Show Message Thread icon

Follow threads

Following a thread collects all messages in a particular email thread and displays them under a Followed Threads header in the Mail panel. When new messages in this thread are received, the header displays in bold with the number of messages received.

To follow a thread:

  1. Highlight a message in the email thread.
  2. Click the arrow on the Show Message Thread icon and select Follow Thread.

To stop following a thread, you can either:

The messages remain in the Received view but are no longer shown under the Followed Threads view.

Ignore a thread

Ignoring a thread automatically marks received and new message in the thread as read. They don't display in the Unread view so you don't have to see them. They are available in the Received view, should you need them.

To ignore a thread:

  1. Select a message in the email thread. Tip: To ensure that you ignore all tangents of a thread, find the first message in the thread.
  2. Highlight a message in the thread, click the Show Message Thread icon, and select Ignore Thread.
  3. All messages in the thread display in gray.
  4. To stop ignoring a thread, highlight a message in the thread, click the Show Message Thread icon and uncheck Ignore Thread.

Mark a thread as read

To mark a thread as read, highlight it, select the Show Message Thread icon, and select Mark Thread as Read or Mark Thread and Go to Next Unread.

Alternatively, you can select these options by right-clicking a message and selecting Thread and options from the context menu.

Search for messages

To search for a message, use the search field above the Mail toolbar. This searches messages in the current view, including both the subject headers and message content. When you type a search term in this field, a gray search bar displays below the Mail toolbar, confirming the view you are searching and the search term. Matching messages display in the Mail window.

Saving a search

Sometimes, you might search your messages regularly using the same query for a particular view. You can save this combination of search query and view by clicking the Save Search button on the right. The search will be saved in Labels and is dynamic; the next time you select it, it searches all messages received for that view and displays them in the resulting list.

Handle spam

Opera Mail features a spam filter, which helps to keep spam out of your way.

Messages may be either marked as spam or displayed in the Spam view. If a message is not spam, highlight it and select the Not Spam button on the Mail toolbar. If the message is from someone you know, but not yet a contact, press A to add the sender to your contacts. Messages from your recorded contacts are assumed not to be spam.

The spam filter is set to learn from your actions by default. You can choose how aggressive you want the spam filter to be. To set spam rules:

  1. Right-click the Spam view and select Properties.
  2. In the Internal filter field, select from Off, Medium (default) or Strong.
  3. If you do not want the spam filter to learn from your actions, uncheck Learn from messages added to or removed from filter.
  4. You can also set additional rules for spam.

Delete messages

You can remove a message from a view, delete a message, or remove a message permanently from Opera Mail, as outlined in the table below.

Depending on the language you have chosen to use, deleted messages go to either Trash or Deleted.

If you want to... Then...
Remove a message from a view, so that it remains in other views Right-click it and select Remove from view
Delete a message and move it to Trash (Deleted) Select the message and either:
  • Press Delete.
  • Select Delete from the Mail toolbar.
  • Right-click and select Move to Trash (Deleted).
Permanently remove a message from Opera Mail in all views Select the message and either:
  • Press Delete, then empty the Trash (Deleted) by right-clicking the folder and selecting Empty Trash (Deleted)
  • Press Shift+Delete

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