Spam email is a permanent feature of modern life, but the volume hitting your inbox is not fixed. A few habits and settings reduce it significantly. Here is what actually makes a difference.
Use the Unsubscribe Link — But Only on Legitimate Mail
On emails from genuine businesses — shops you have bought from, newsletters you signed up for — the unsubscribe link works and is safe to use. After you unsubscribe, mail from that sender should stop, although it can take a short while. ICO guidance says organisations should act promptly on unsubscribe requests.
On obvious spam from unknown senders, do not unsubscribe. Clicking that link tells the sender that your address is active and a human reads it. That information is valuable to spammers. Mark it as spam instead and let your email provider’s filter learn from it. It usually then goes to a spam or junk folder.
Set Up Filters in Your Email App
Most email clients and web interfaces let you create rules.
Be careful with any rule that deletes mail. Real mail can match it, such as messages that contain only an attachment or a confirmation, and deleted mail may not be recoverable. Before you delete anything, check that you have a copy somewhere else, such as in your cloud account or on an external drive. Move matches to a review folder first, check that folder for a while, and only then delete. Check how long your email app keeps deleted messages before you rely on a delete rule.
Common useful rules:
- Move emails containing the word unsubscribe in the footer to a Newsletters folder, and only check that folder once a week
- Automatically delete messages with no body text
- Flag messages where your email address does not appear in the To or CC field
These rules run automatically and keep your main inbox cleaner without you having to make decisions about individual messages.
Be More Careful Where You Put Your Email Address
Every time you enter your address into a website — a competition entry, a free download, a checkout — you are a potential spam source. Some sites sell address lists. Some get breached. Some have genuinely poor data practices.
Keep a second email address for sign-ups, competitions, and anything where you are uncertain. Use your main address only for people you know and services you genuinely rely on. Gmail, Outlook, and most providers let you create additional addresses or aliases for free.
Do Not Publish Your Email Address in Plain Text Online
If your email address appears on a public website, forum, or social media profile in plain text, automated tools called harvesters will find it and add it to lists within days. Either avoid this entirely, or write it in a format that humans can read but scripts cannot parse easily: yourname [at] example [dot] com.
Most website contact forms protect against this by collecting the message on the site and forwarding it server-side — which is why they are preferable to a plain mailto link.
Report Spam Correctly
When you mark a message as spam or junk, you are not just moving it out of your inbox — you are contributing to your email provider’s filtering model. That model improves over time. If you have been deleting spam rather than marking it, switching to using the spam/junk button will gradually improve your filtering.
In Gmail, the Report phishing option (under the three-dot menu) sends data to Google’s anti-abuse teams. In Outlook, the Report button does the same for Microsoft. Use these on suspicious messages that look like phishing attempts.
Check Whether Your Address Has Been Leaked
The website haveibeenpwned.com lets you check whether your email address has appeared in any known data breaches. If it has, that explains some of your spam. Change the password for any accounts associated with that breach, and consider using a different address going forward.
If you receive bounce messages (notices that your email could not be delivered) for mail you never sent, or people tell you they are getting strange emails from your address, your account may be being used to send spam. Stop and get help from your email provider’s support, using its official help pages.
These steps will not eliminate spam entirely, but they will get the volume down to manageable.
Last updated: October 9, 2026