Deleting email messages from the iPhone’s or iPad’s Mail inbox has always been relatively simple, but I’d never describe it as fun—well, not until now, anyway.
In the previous version of iOS, swiping to delete email from the Mail inbox was a two-step procedure: swipe the message from right to left, then tap the red Delete button.
With the just-released iOS 8, you can still perform the two-step, swipe-and-tap method of deleting messages, but there’s also a far more satisfying way—one that I stumbled across by accident.
When you swipe a message to delete it, keep on swiping until the red Delete button stretches all the way across the display.
Release, and poof! The message is gone.
Put simply, deleting email in iOS 8 is now a one-swipe operation—and boy, does it feel good.
(For those keeping score, yes: users of Gmail for Android have been enjoying one-swipe message deleting for quite some time now.)
Bonus tips
- You can mark an email message as “read” or “unread” with a single swipe from left to right.
- You can choose which buttons (such as “Flag,” “Mark as Read,” and “Archive”) appear when you swipe a message in your inbox by tapping Settings, “Mail, Contacts, Calendars,” and then “Swipe Options” under the Mail heading. For example, you can make the “Flag” button appear when you swipe from left to right, rather than right to left.
Got more questions about iOS 8? Post ’em below, or drop me a line.