Recovered Messages in Mac Mailbox - How to Best Handle?

[RadDave]

Hi All - I'm on Apple Mail in Sonoma and trying to rid myself of old emails (e.g. in the Sent folders) on my Yahoo account (signing in on a browser) and on my Mac laptop - on the latter in Mail, I came across the 'Recovered Messages' mailbox (first pic below - LINK) - looking in this mailbox (2nd pic) I have 2,693 messages dating back to 2016 (most of these were likely deleted, so I don't want to really move them) - rebuilding that mailbox did nothing - can I simply delete these inside that mailbox and not expect them to be repopulated in some fashion? Thanks for comments and help. Dave

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[Jimmysb]

I found when using Apple mail that "on my Mac" saved some emails, these are as described on your Mac, so not on the server, and if you delete them, and empty your deleted folder these should go.

 

[RadDave]

I found when using Apple mail that "on my Mac" saved some emails, these are as described on your Mac, so not on the server, and if you delete them, and empty your deleted folder these should go.

Thanks Jimmy - for a trial I deleted 3 messages in the 'Recovered Messages' mailbox, where they went to the 'Trash' folder within 'On My Mac' - emptied that folder and poof, seem to be gone - will work on more later today. Dave

 

[MacInWin]

Once you have them all deleted and are happy with it, rebuild the mail database to recover the disk space.

Mail>Mailbox>Rebuild

 

[RadDave]

Once you have them all deleted and are happy with it, rebuild the mail database to recover the disk space.

Mail>Mailbox>Rebuild

Thanks Jake - should I be in the 'Recovered Messages' mailbox when I issue that command - I'm assuming that it's meant for individual mailboxes on the Mac or otherwise? Dave

 

[MacInWin]

Here are a couple of Apple articles you might want to read:

Rebuild mailboxes in Mail on Mac

In Mail on your Mac, if messages are missing or garbled, you may need to rebuild a mailbox to update the list of emails it contains.

support.apple.com

and

If messages are in a Recovered Messages mailbox in Mail on Mac

In Mail on your Mac, some messages may appear in a Recovered Messages mailbox.

support.apple.com

From the readiing, the rebuild is mailbox-by-mailbox.

 

[ferrarr]

Wondering what constitutes a "Mailbox"? Is iCloud one mailbox or is it Inbox, sent, drafts, junk, etc, are they all mailboxes?

 

[Jimmysb]

Wondering what constitutes a "Mailbox"? Is iCloud one mailbox or is it Inbox, sent, drafts, junk, etc, are they all mailboxes?

It seems that within Apple Mail each folder is called a Mailbox, coming from windows, initially this was difficult to grasp, but it is just Apple terminology.

 

[MacInWin]

It seems that within Apple Mail each folder is called a Mailbox, coming from windows, initially this was difficult to grasp, but it is just Apple terminology.

That is kind of simplistic. In addition to the various folders for inbox, sent, draft, junk, trash, etc., there are other folders that hold the attachments for each message in any and all of those folders. And those attachments are linked by Mail to the individual messages to which they are attached.

It looks a lot more simple than it really is. Mucking about in the internals of Mail is risky business.

 

[Jimmysb]

That is kind of simplistic. In addition to the various folders for inbox, sent, draft, junk, trash, etc., there are other folders that hold the attachments for each message in any and all of those folders. And those attachments are linked by Mail to the individual messages to which they are attached.

It looks a lot more simple than it really is. Mucking about in the internals of Mail is risky business.

Do it on your IMAP server, and it is guaranteed to spread across all your devices, assuming you use IMAP.

 

[MacInWin]

Do it on your IMAP server, and it is guaranteed to spread across all your devices, assuming you use IMAP.

Do what? I didn't make any suggestions for anything to do, other than to be careful.

 

[Jimmysb]

Do what? I didn't make any suggestions for anything to do, other than to be careful.

It looks a lot more simple than it really is. Mucking about in the internals of Mail is risky business.

You mentioned the risk of mucking about in the internals of Mail, which I do not disagree with and therefore suggested making the change in your IMAP server.