Guides · Updated November 2026

How to pin an email to the top of Gmail

Gmail has no pin button. Outlook does; Gmail doesn't. But there are four ways to get close, and which one is right depends on whether you want the email on top now, or on top later.

Option 1: Star it and put starred mail first

This is the closest thing Gmail has to pinning. Starred emails get their own section above everything else.

1. Open the email and click the star (or press s if keyboard shortcuts are on).
2. Click the gear at the top right of Gmail.
3. Under Inbox type, choose Starred first.

Starred emails now sit in a section above the rest of your inbox until you unstar them. The catch: everything you star lands there, sorted by date, so after a few weeks the section is long and the email you cared about is at the bottom of it.

Option 2: A "Pinned" section with Multiple inboxes

If you already use stars for something else, give pinned emails their own label and section.

1. Create a label called Pinned and add it to the email.
2. Gear → See all settings → Inbox tab.
3. Set Inbox type to Multiple inboxes, put label:pinned in Section 1, set Position to Above the inbox, and save.

This works on a computer only; the Gmail phone app ignores it.

Option 3: Mark it unread

With Inbox type → Unread first, anything unread floats into its own top section. Plenty of people use "unread" as a to-do flag. It breaks the moment you open the email, which is usually the moment you meant to deal with it later.

Option 4: Bring it back to the top at a set time

Often what you want isn't "pinned forever" but "on top again when I'm ready to deal with it": tomorrow morning, Monday, after a meeting. Gmail's Snooze does that, but it hides the email until then. To keep it visible and have it come back on top later, schedule a reply to yourself:

1. Open the email and click Reply.
2. Remove everyone from To, Cc and Bcc, and put your own address in To. Check this twice: if you skip it, everyone on the thread gets your note.
3. Write a line to yourself, like "Deal with this."
4. Click the small arrow next to Send, choose Schedule send, and pick the time.

At that time Gmail delivers your note into the same conversation, and the whole thread jumps to the top of your inbox, unread. Until then it stays exactly where it was. Gmail allows up to 100 scheduled emails at once, and you can cancel any of them from the Scheduled folder.

Which should you use?