Schedule an email in Apple Mail on Desktop
The desktop version of Apple Mail covers a wide screen. Despite this, the way to schedule an email is somewhat hidden.
To find it, you'll want to follow the standard instructions for writing your email:
- Go to your Mail App found on the macOS desktop.
- Click on the New Message button (you can find this in the mail toolbar or on your touch bar).
- Fill out the message as you normally would (recipients, subject line, and body).
Once done with these steps, you'd tap the send button to get it out. Instead, you'll want to click on an Arrow Icon just to the right of the send icon.
The Send Later option will bring up a new menu that lets you set exact time and date requirements. You can select any time and date that works best for your needs, scheduling months in advance as you need to.
You'll know you've done it right when you open your app and see the in-progress message in your Send Later folder.
From this screen, you can edit the message by clicking the icon in the top menu. If you prefer to cancel the email, simply delete it. To reschedule it, you’ll need to either edit or delete it.
💡 Note: The email scheduling feature in Apple Mail is not supported on macOS Monterey 12 or earlier. On these older versions, the standard Apple Mail app cannot schedule emails to send later, so users need to rely on third-party mail clients like Spark or Outlook.
The feature is available starting with macOS Ventura 13 and continues to be supported in newer versions, including macOS Sonoma 14 and macOS Sequoia 15.
Looking ahead, this scheduling feature is also expected to be fully supported in the upcoming macOS 26 Tahoe, anticipated for release in fall 2025, likely in September or October.
You can use applications like Spark, Outlook, or Google if you want to schedule emails on older macOS versions. If the send later apple mail button is missing, that’s a sign you have an older version.
Tips for scheduling messages on your Mac
- Take the time to consider desktop readability and formatting before sending the mail.
- If you use an Apple app like Automator, you'll need to keep your computer on during the send time. Otherwise, the latest version of Apple products will send without you needing your device on.
Schedule an email on iPhone's Apple Mail App
Because the mobile version of Apple's mail application uses a smaller screen, they need somewhere to put the email scheduler. Once again, it's somewhat hidden but not hard to get to.
You'll follow the usual steps to compose and create your messages. Be sure to take care of the content before you schedule it.
To schedule it, follow these steps:
- Hold down the send button and wait for a menu to pop up.
- Select from the menu options (based on what works for your needs).
- Choose "send later" if none of the default options work.
- Pick a specific date and time that fits your needs.
Much like the Mac version, you'll know you've done it right when you see a dedicated "send later" folder. You can also edit and delete your mail from that same folder.
If you have Apple's Handoff set up, you can edit or delete the scheduled email from either device (regardless of where you started). So, if you want to look at the message from your desktop, you can do that.
Now that you know how to schedule an email using Apple Mail, we can get into other inbox organization tips.
Tips for scheduling an email on iPhone
- It's a good idea to start a message on a mobile device and move it to your desktop to see how it looks. It's often easier to edit and format using Apple Mail's desktop application.
- Older versions of the iPhone might not support the version of Apple Mail that supports scheduling. In these cases, you should try out a third-party app like MailSuite.
- Be sure to schedule your emails when you know they are most likely to be read. Many people check their email in the morning, which is why Apple often defaults to 8:00 AM during the weekdays.
Take Control of Your Time and Inbox with Clean Email
Knowing how to schedule your messages is great, but it’s only half the solution. To get even more time back, you need a tidy inbox. That’s where Clean Email comes in.
Clean Email is a privacy-focused email management and organization service that brings order to your messy inbox. It’s available for macOS and iPhone so you can manage your Apple Mail inbox on the go.
When you first use Clean Email, the service will automatically categorize your messages into Smart Folders like Travel, Finance and Insurance, Social Notifications, Seasonal Sales, and more.
You can then further refine your emails within a Smart Folder using various criteria like size or date sent. This makes it easy to focus on only the emails that matter to you.
Once you’ve filtered your inbox to only show the emails that match your criteria, you can do any standard email action on them like Delete, Archive, or Label.
Clean Email also has an Auto Clean feature that lets you automate repetitive tasks. With Auto Clean, you can set custom rules with various criteria, which are usually limited in standard email providers and clients.
Beyond filtering, Clean Email also has an Unsubscriber feature that blocks annoying newsletters and other subscription-based emails from clogging your inbox.
If you want to keep some emails but read them later, you have options like moving them out of your inbox (Deliver to "Read Later") or automatically marking them as read. These features help manage less urgent but potentially distracting email communications.
Clean Email works with all major email services including iCloud.com, Gmail, Outlook, and Yahoo. It also works on mobile platforms, iOS and Android, so you can manage your email across all your devices.
Schedule an email in Apple Mail - FAQs
Can you set a timer for an email to send in Apple Mail?
Yes. Apple Mail lets you set a specific date and time for your future-dated emails. This sets up a countdown timer for the app to follow, sending your message when the timer is up.
To see a version of this timer, check the remaining time under your "send later" folder. It won't break down into minutes or seconds but will give you a good idea of how much time you have.
Will a delayed email still send if Apple Mail is closed?
Yes. Apple Mail works on the cloud, meaning you don't need to open it. Once you schedule a message, that scheduling notification is sent to the cloud-based application. So, most of the application's functions are handled through Apple's servers.
Will a scheduled email in Apple Mail send without the internet?
No. Your message won't be scheduled if you don't have an active internet connection. However, you can send commands from your application that will be sent to Apple's servers upon reconnection. To make this work, you'll need to connect to the internet before the email's scheduled time.
