It’s worth bearing in mind however that unlike other email clients like Outlook, you don’t have a recall button. Instead, you have a selected timeframe to “unsend” an email.
So, if you haven’t clicked on undo in the time you’ve set this for (this is explained below) unfortunately there’s no going back!
- Click on the cog icon at the top right of the page and click on Settings
- Under the first (main) tab scroll down to Undo Send and click Enable
- Click on the drop down box to choose the time limit you have to hit undo. (You can choose from 5, 10 or 30 seconds)
- Hit Save Changes at the bottom of the page
- When you next send an email the Your message has been sent box will appear with an additional undo option (a link on a yellow background)
- If you click on it within your selected time frame the recipient will never know you sent it. It can be a godsend!
Free report
Why recalling an email in Gmail doesn’t always work
As mentioned above you can’t recall a message in Gmail – instead it delays sending a message over an extremely short timeframe.
If you miss clicking "Undo," then the email has been sent.
If you navigate away from the screen that shows once the email has been sent the option to “Undo” goes away.
Other Solutions
Choose a different email service such as Egress Prevent, which stops emails being sent to the wrong people. The software recognises email usage patterns and previous email data, recognising and alerting users to misaddressed emails before they press send, which can come as a huge relief! Alternatively, if you use Outlook, read our guide to recalling an email in Outlook.
