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Is there a way to send a delayed email with Gmail or any other mail client?

I would like to be able to select a time delay before clicking send and then the message would not actually be sent for a certain period of time.

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7 Answers

up vote 5 down vote accepted

Is there a way to send a delayed email with gmail or any other mail client?

You can do this with Thunderbird 2 and the Send Later addon, here's a step-by-step tutorial:

How to Send an Email at a Specific Time in the Future Using Mozilla Thunderbird.

Thunderbird is free open source software (FOSS), a portable version is available here.

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up vote 2 down vote

Outlook, for some versions already, can delay the sending of emails. This is done in the Message Options:

alt text

And of course, you can retrieve Google Mail's messages without problems using Outlook.

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I believe the option in Outlook requires you to have your Outlook client open at the time you have scheduled the email for. It basically sits in your local Outbox until the time passes and the next Send/Receive occurs. – Carl Apr 23 '11 at 6:31
Worth also noting that when the email arrives at the recipient then (in the same organisation at least) the date and time sent is that of when you pressed "send" - and not when you set the "do not deliver before" time. This is so you can't fool your boss into thinking you are at work when you are really still in bed. – Richard Apr 9 '12 at 9:45
up vote 2 down vote

You could try Boomerang for Gmail. It allows you to schedule an email in Gmail to be sent later and set easy email reminders. It is a Chrome and Firefox extension/addon.

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+1 for the great recommendation. I signed up for a similar service DeferredSender, but never used it because it wasn't as simple as this (plus DeferredSender seems to no longer exist). – newenglander Apr 9 '12 at 9:20
up vote 1 down vote

I create the email I want to send, save it as a draft (including any attachments, etc.), then I set a calendar entry to remind me to send the email on a specific day/time. This way I don't have to create it when I need it, and if I'm mobile on my iPhone (or any smart phone), I just have to go to my drafts folder, open the message and hit send when I get the appointment reminder. Almost as good as send later.

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up vote 0 down vote

In GMail, currently no (although I could've swear there was something like that in the Labs). But, you can always save your email as draft until you're ready to send it.

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(although I could've swear there was something like that in the Labs) Vaguely remember such a thing. April Fools' prank perhaps ? – Sathya♦ Jan 31 '10 at 15:57
No, no ... it was some weird experiment from the Labs. Something along the likes "you send your girlfriend an angry mail, and then decide not to send it ..." - I can't remember the details; since I never used it. – ldigas Jan 31 '10 at 18:26
Isn't that the undo-feature you're thinking of? "Undo Send by Yuzo F Oops, hit "Send" too soon? Stop messages from being sent for a few seconds after hitting the send button." It's available in labs, but only delays up to 30 secs, so doesn't answer this question. – Kleist Apr 9 '12 at 23:27
up vote 0 down vote

Gmail-delay-send is a script you can install and use to send mail in gmail at a time in the future. I use it and I like it. Here is the home page: https://code.google.com/p/gmail-delay-send/

Tweak Master's House of Useful Tricks has a great blog post comparing a few different methods for sending delayed gmail, including Gmail-delay-send and Boomerang: http://tweakmasters.blogspot.com/2013/01/how-to-schedule-e-mail-sending-with.html

Another third party tool I found that looks like it will work: http://www.rightinbox.com/.

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up vote -1 down vote

I have modified the Formmail script from Matt's Script Archive to provide a scheduled email delivery for users on an apache web server. For any sysadmin interested in trying this go to

http://www.eleceng.adelaide.edu.au/Personal/dbowler/delaymail/

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Welcome to Super User! It would be nice to include the essential parts of the answer here, and provide the link only for future reference. – slhck♦ May 2 '12 at 8:56
-1 for only posting a link, and not fixing it after several months. The user was last seen in May and doesn't seem to have contributed anything other than this answer; his account may be a candidate for deletion. – Blacklight Shining Dec 31 '12 at 13:48
In addition, the link doesn't seem to be relevant to this question. The mentioned script is for those who are running mail services, and for it to be useful, Google (or whatever other provider) would have to install it (which I can almost guarantee they're not going to do). – Blacklight Shining Dec 31 '12 at 13:50

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