Getting started with Nemi Mail

Nemi Mail is an email address of your own with an inbox built around one question: what needs you. It belongs to you personally rather than to a workspace, so the sidebar shows your name where the other apps show the workspace switcher, and nobody you share a workspace with can see your mail.

Your first address#

1. 1

   Open Mail

   From the app switcher. The first time, Nemi Mail suggests an address made from your Nemi username: with the username anna, that is anna@nemimail.com.

2. 2

   Pick your address

   Keep the suggestion or type another. You see straight away whether it is free. Use letters, numbers, dots, hyphens and underscores, at least three characters.

3. 3

   Read the two ideas that make it different

   The Screener and bundles, explained on the next screens and in The Screener and bundles.

The keys worth learning#

Press ? in Mail for every shortcut, or read Keyboard shortcuts in Mail. On Windows and Linux, use Ctrl where a key says Cmd.

Flags#

Flag a conversation to come back to it: press s, or the flag button at the top of an open conversation. Flags come in seven colours: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple and gray. To choose one, right-click a conversation in the list and pick Flag colour, or right-click the flag button in an open conversation; Flag colour is also in the conversation's More actions menu. After that, s flags in the colour you picked last in that browser. Press s again to take the flag off. Flagged in the sidebar lists every flagged conversation, and the colours above that list show one colour at a time.

Folders#

Folders give conversations one place of your own. Press New folder (the plus beside Folders in the sidebar), type a name and press Return. A folder can hold subfolders, three levels deep at most, and you can have up to 300 folders. To file conversations, drag them onto a folder in the sidebar, or press v (Move to) and pick the folder; with more than eight folders, Move to has a field to find one by name.

• A conversation in a folder leaves the inbox and Archive. Its folder shows under the subject when you open it, and the number beside a folder counts its unread conversations.
• When a new message arrives in that conversation, it comes back to the inbox, the same as an archived conversation does.
• Right-click a folder, or press its options button, for Rename, New subfolder, Move up, Move down and Delete. Rename and New subfolder happen right in the sidebar.
• Deleting a folder deletes its subfolders too. Nemi first tells you how many conversations it holds; they move to Archive, and nothing is deleted from your mail.
• Search with in: and a folder name, like in:clients, or in:"client work" for a name with spaces.

Labels#

Labels sort conversations your own way, and one conversation can carry several, wherever it is. Press New label (the plus beside Labels in the sidebar) to make one, then add it from a conversation with l, or drag conversations onto it in the sidebar. To delete a label, open it and press the options button at the top of its list: the label comes off every conversation, and the conversations themselves stay.

Reading beside the list or full page#

A conversation opens beside the list, or across the whole window, whichever you choose with the button beside the search box or with Shift+V. A window narrower than 1120 pixels, and every phone, always opens conversations full page, because two columns do not fit. On a phone, press Select above the list to pick several conversations at once. In a conversation the newest message is on top, with Reply right under it; Conversation order in Settings puts the oldest on top instead.

Search understands a few operators: from:anna, to:jack, subject:invoice, has:attachment, is:unread, is:flagged, in:clients (one of your folders), before:2026-10-01, after:2026-09-01, and "exact phrases" in quotes.

Settings#

Settings sits at the bottom of the sidebar, or press g then the comma key. General holds the reading pane (beside the list or full page), the density of the list, the order of messages in a conversation, when a conversation counts as read, how long Undo send waits, and Single-key shortcuts. Turn single-key shortcuts off if letters like e and j get in the way of voice control, a screen reader or a switch device; keys with Cmd or Ctrl, the arrows, Return and Esc keep working. That switch applies to the browser you set it in.