Retrieve individual Gmail messages with a specific label using Google Apps Script

Other Questions Gmail
1

I’m trying to process order emails that come in daily. They’re all labeled ‘InProcess’ but some are grouped in threads while others are separate. My current script only grabs emails in threads, missing the individual ones. Here’s what I’ve got:

function handleEmails() {
  var sourceLabel = GmailApp.getUserLabelByName('Incoming');
  var targetLabel = GmailApp.getUserLabelByName('Processed');
  var emailThreads = sourceLabel.getThreads();

  if (emailThreads.length > 0) {
    for (var i = emailThreads.length - 1; i >= 0; i--) {
      var currentThread = emailThreads[i];
      var emailsInThread = currentThread.getMessages();

      for (var j = 0; j < emailsInThread.length; j++) {
        var email = emailsInThread[j];
        var emailContent = email.getPlainBody();
        console.log(emailContent);

        // Process email here
      }

      currentThread.addLabel(targetLabel).refresh();
      currentThread.removeLabel(sourceLabel).refresh();
    }
  }
}

This script misses individual emails not in threads. Is there a way to get all messages with the ‘InProcess’ label, regardless of thread status? Maybe something like GmailApp.search() could work? Any tips would be great!

2

You’re on the right track with GmailApp.search(). Here’s a more comprehensive solution:

function handleEmails() {
var sourceLabel = ‘InProcess’;
var targetLabel = ‘Processed’;
var emails = GmailApp.search(‘label:’ + sourceLabel);

for (var i = 0; i < emails.length; i++) {
var messages = emails[i].getMessages();
for (var j = 0; j < messages.length; j++) {
var email = messages[j];
var emailContent = email.getPlainBody();
console.log(emailContent);

  // Process email here
  
  email.addLabel(GmailApp.getUserLabelByName(targetLabel));
  email.removeLabel(GmailApp.getUserLabelByName(sourceLabel));
}

}
}

This script will process all emails with the ‘InProcess’ label, whether they’re in threads or not. It also handles labeling at the individual message level for more precise control.

3

I’ve dealt with a similar issue before, and here’s what worked for me:

function processLabeledEmails() {
var searchQuery = ‘label:InProcess’;
var messages = GmailApp.search(searchQuery, 0, 500);

for (var i = 0; i < messages.length; i++) {
var email = messages[i].getMessages()[0];
var subject = email.getSubject();
var body = email.getPlainBody();

// Your processing logic here
console.log('Processing email: ' + subject);

// Move to 'Processed' label
email.addLabel(GmailApp.getUserLabelByName('Processed'));
email.removeLabel(GmailApp.getUserLabelByName('InProcess'));

}
}

This approach uses GmailApp.search() to get all emails with the ‘InProcess’ label, regardless of threading. It processes each email individually, which solved the issue of missing non-threaded messages. The ‘0, 500’ parameters limit results to 500 emails per run to avoid timeouts on large inboxes. Adjust as needed for your volume.

4

hey, i think u can use GmailApp.search() like this:

var emails = GmailApp.search(‘label:InProcess’);

for (var i = 0; i < emails.length; i++) {
var email = emails[i].getMessages()[0];
// process email here
}

this should grab all emails with that label, threaded or not. hope it helps!