---
title: "AI email labels"
description: "Say what a label is for in plain words, and AI adds it to new mail that fits. Try it on recent mail first. It only labels and never moves mail."
url: "https://openemail.uk/features/ai-labels"
---

[Reading & organising](https://openemail.uk/features.md#reading)

# AI labels Described once, applied as mail arrives.

Write what a label is for in plain words, such as “invoices and receipts”, and switch on “Apply to new mail automatically”. From then on, AI adds the label to new mail that fits.

[Open mail](https://openemail.uk/mail/inbox) [Get Started](https://openemail.uk/signup.md)[All features](https://openemail.uk/features.md)

In short

## What is an AI label?

An AI label is an ordinary label with a description of the mail it is for. AI reads each arriving message against that description and adds the label when it fits. There are no conditions to write, only a sentence such as “anything from investors”.

How it works

## Labelled as it arrives

As mail arrives, AI reads it and adds the labels that fit. It only labels, so nothing is archived or moved and the message stays where it landed.

## See what it would catch

“Try it on recent mail” reads your newest 20 inbox conversations and lists the ones the label would catch. A try labels nothing, so you can reword the description until the list looks right.

## Every AI label in one pass

Each arriving message is read once for all of the workspace’s AI labels, and it picks up every one that fits. A wire receipt from an investor can carry Invoices and Investors together.

What you get

## In the product today

No AI actions for arriving mail

Labelling arriving mail spends none of your daily AI actions. Trying a label spends one.

Read with data collection denied

AI reads the sender, the subject and the start of the text of each new message.

In code too

A label carries aiInstructions and aiEnabled on the REST API, in the SDKs, on the command line and over MCP. In the SDK, labels.test tries one.

Good practice

## Getting the most out of it

1. 01
   
   Describe it as you would to a colleague
   
   “Invoices and receipts from suppliers” says more than “money”. Name who sends the mail or what it is about.
2. 02
   
   Try before you switch it on
   
   Read the list a try gives you. If it catches too much or too little, reword the description and try again.
3. 03
   
   Use a rule for an exact match
   
   When one sender or one word in the subject decides it every time, a rule does the job. Keep AI labels for mail you can only describe.

Questions

## Asked often

Keep going

## Works well with

Labels

Name a label, pick a colour, and filter the list down to it.

Rules you write yourself

Your own conditions, and what should happen to anything that matches them.

Thread summaries

A few lines at the top of a conversation that say what it is about, brought up to date as it grows.

Start

## Your domain, your mail.

Point a domain at OpenEmail and read it in a mailbox built around it. The free plan covers one domain.

[Open mail](https://openemail.uk/mail/inbox) [Get Started](https://openemail.uk/signup.md)[Read the reference](https://openemail.uk/docs/knowledge/reading/ai-labels.md)