How to Create and Manage All Mail Filters in TrekMail

This guide walks you through every step of creating, editing, reordering, and deleting mail filters in TrekMail. By the end, you will have a working filter and know how to troubleshoot the most common issues.

If you are new to filters and want to understand what they are first, start with our Mail Filters Overview.

Where to find filters in the dashboard

Log in to your TrekMail dashboard.
Click Mailboxes in the left sidebar.
Find the mailbox you want to configure and click the Settings button (the gear icon) next to it.
In the settings panel, click the Filters tab.

You will see a list of any filters you have already created, or an empty state with a prompt to add your first one.

Creating a new filter, step by step

Click the + Add filter button at the top of the Filters tab. A dialog will open with several sections. Here is what each one means and how to fill it in.

Step 1 — Name your filter (optional but recommended)

At the top of the dialog you will see a Filter name text field. This is optional, but giving your filter a clear name makes life easier when you have several filters to manage later. Use something descriptive like "Forward invoices to Sara" or "Flag emails from BigCorp."

Step 2 — Set your conditions

Below the name field is the Conditions section. This is where you tell TrekMail which emails this filter should match.

Each condition has three parts:

Field — a dropdown where you choose what to check. Options are: From, To, Subject, Body, Size, or Custom Header.
Comparison — a dropdown where you choose how to compare. Options include "contains," "is exactly," "does not contain," "starts with," "ends with," and others depending on the field. For Size, you will see "is greater than" and "is less than."
Value — a text box where you type the actual word, phrase, or email address to match.

For example, to match all emails from your vendor FreshBooks:

Field: From
Comparison: contains
Value: freshbooks.com

To add more conditions, click the + Add condition link below the first one. You can add as many conditions as you need.

Step 3 — Choose "All conditions" or "Any condition"

When you have more than one condition, a toggle appears at the top of the Conditions section. This is an important choice:

All conditions means every single condition must be true for the filter to match. Think of it as "AND." The email must match condition 1 AND condition 2 AND condition 3.
Any condition means the filter matches if at least one condition is true. Think of it as "OR." The email only needs to match condition 1 OR condition 2 OR condition 3.

Real-world example with "All conditions": You want to catch invoices specifically from FreshBooks. You set two conditions:

From contains freshbooks.com
Subject contains invoice

With "All conditions" selected, only emails that are both from FreshBooks AND have "invoice" in the subject will match. A marketing email from FreshBooks about their new features would not match because its subject probably does not contain "invoice."

Real-world example with "Any condition": You want to flag emails from any of your three biggest clients. You set three conditions:

From contains acmecorp.com
From contains globex.com
From contains initech.com

With "Any condition" selected, an email from any one of those three domains will trigger the filter. The email does not need to be from all three at once (which would be impossible anyway).

Step 4 — Choose your actions

Below the conditions, you will find the Actions section. Click the Action dropdown and choose what should happen to matching emails:

Action	What it does	Best used for
Move to folder	Delivers the email to a specific folder instead of your inbox. A second dropdown appears where you pick the folder.	Organizing invoices, newsletters, or project-specific mail into folders.
Forward a copy to	Sends a copy to another email address (you type it in the text box that appears). The original stays in your mailbox.	Sharing invoices with your accountant or client emails with a teammate.
Forward (no copy)	Redirects the email to another address. It does NOT stay in your mailbox.	Routing emails you do not need to see, like support tickets going to a team queue.
Mark as flagged	Flags or stars the email so it stands out in your inbox.	Making VIP client emails or urgent messages easy to spot.
Mark as read	Delivers the email with the read/Seen flag already set, so it does not appear in your unread count. The email is still saved to your inbox (or to the folder if combined with Move to folder).	Low-priority alerts, automated reports, or newsletters you want archived without bumping your unread badge.
Discard silently	Deletes the email with no notification to the sender.	Getting rid of persistent unwanted messages that are not caught by spam filters.
Reject with message	Bounces the email back to the sender with a custom message you type.	Letting senders know this address does not accept certain types of mail.

You can add multiple actions to a single filter by clicking + Add action. For example, you could forward a copy to your accountant AND move the original to your Invoices folder.

Step 5 — The "Stop processing" checkbox

At the bottom of the dialog, you will see a checkbox labeled Stop processing further filters.

When this is checked, TrekMail will not evaluate any filters below this one for the matched email. The current filter's actions run, and that is it.

When this is unchecked, TrekMail continues checking filters below this one. If another filter also matches, its actions will run too.

When to use it: Most of the time, you want this checked. It keeps things predictable. Uncheck it only if you intentionally want multiple filters to act on the same email (for example, one filter flags it and a second filter moves it to a folder).

Step 6 — Save

Click the Save filter button. Your new filter appears in the list and is immediately active (on Pro and Agency plans). Emails arriving from this point forward will be processed by your new rule.

Editing an existing filter

On the Filters tab, find the filter you want to change.
Click the Edit button on the filter card.
The same dialog from creation opens, pre-filled with your existing settings.
Make your changes and click Save filter.

Your changes take effect immediately for all new incoming mail.

Deleting a filter

On the Filters tab, find the filter you want to remove.
Click the Delete button on the filter card.
A confirmation prompt will appear. Click Confirm to delete.

The filter is removed immediately. Emails that were already processed by the filter are not affected — they stay wherever the filter moved them.

Reordering filters (and why it matters)

Filters run from top to bottom. The first filter that matches an email wins, and later filters are skipped (unless "Stop processing" is unchecked). This makes order critical.

To reorder filters, use the arrow buttons on the left side of any filter card. Click the up arrow to move a filter higher in the list (higher priority) or the down arrow to move it lower.

A concrete example of why order matters:

Imagine you have these two filters:

If From contains anyone then Forward a copy to team@company.com
If Subject contains spam-keyword then Discard silently

An email arrives with "spam-keyword" in the subject. Filter 1 matches first (because "From contains anyone" is broad enough to match everything). The email gets forwarded to your team. Filter 2 never runs. Your team just received spam.

The fix: move the "Discard" filter above the "Forward" filter. Now the spam gets caught and discarded before the forwarding filter has a chance to act.

Rule of thumb: put your most specific filters at the top and your broadest filters at the bottom.

Filter limits per plan

Each TrekMail plan has a cap on how many filters you can create:

Plan	Mail filters	Forwarding rules	Are they active?
Nano	—	—	—
Starter	—	3 per mailbox	Forwarding only
Pro	10 per mailbox	5 per mailbox	Yes
Agency	50 per mailbox	25 per mailbox	Yes

When you hit your limit, the + Add filter button will be disabled and you will see a message suggesting you upgrade. Mail filters require Pro or Agency plan.

Troubleshooting: "I created a filter but it is not working"

If your filter does not seem to be doing anything, walk through this checklist:

Is your plan active? Filters on Nano and Starter plans are saved but do not run. Check your plan under Account Settings.
Is the email arriving after the filter was created? Filters only apply to new incoming mail. They do not retroactively process emails already in your mailbox.
Is the email landing in Junk? Spam is caught before filters run. If the email is being flagged as spam, it never reaches your filters. Mark it as "Not Spam" and it should be processed next time.
Check your conditions carefully. A common mistake is using "is exactly" when you meant "contains." If your condition is From is exactly john@acme.com but the email comes from John Smith <john@acme.com>, it will not match because the From field includes the display name.
Check filter order. Is another filter higher in the list matching the email first? That filter's actions run and yours gets skipped. Review the order and adjust if needed.
Check the "Stop processing" setting on filters above yours. If an earlier filter has "Stop processing" checked and it matches the email, your filter will never run.
Is the action correct? Double-check that you selected the right action. "Move to folder" and "Forward a copy" look similar in a quick glance but do very different things.

If none of the above helps, contact TrekMail support with the filter name and an example of an email that should have matched. We can check the server logs to see exactly what happened.

Creating and Managing Filters