How To Delete Multiple Emails On Iphone 5c

iOS Mail

If you have updated to iOS 10 you may have noticed that the Mail app "Trash All" option is missing on the iPhone and iPad. This is unfortunate because the ability to delete all email in iOS is easily one of the more useful features to managing a busy email inbox. The lack of a "Delete All" button in Mail for iOS 10.0, iOS 10.0.1, and iOS 10.0.2 could just be a bug or mishap, but in the meantime if you're looking to regain that trash all functionality we'll show you a workaround that accomplishes a similar "Delete All" mail ability.

By the way, it's not just "Trash All" that is missing in iOS 10 Mail, it's also any ability to bulk select all emails in general. For now the workaround involves a lot of tapping and manually selecting emails and then trashing them, it's a bit cumbersome but it gets the job done on iPhone and iPad.

How to "Delete All" Mail in iOS 10

Open the Mail app in iOS 10
Go to the inbox or mailbox folder you want to delete all emails from
Tap on the "Edit" button in the upper right corner

How to delete all email in iOS 10

Now manually tap on every single email you want to delete, as signified by having a blue check mark next to the email message
Now choose "Trash" in the corner

Select emails and then choose Trash

Confirm that you want to delete all selected emails by choosing "Trash Selected Messages"

Confirm to delete all emails in iOS 10

Repeat with other folders and emails as necessary

Quite a bit more hands on than before, but it works the same.

Losing a feature is rather unusual with an iOS software update, which suggests the removal of Trash All in Mail may be inadvertent. It remains to be seen if future releases of iOS 10.x will regain the ability, but hopefully we'll regain the same ability to delete all emails on iPhone and iPad that existed in prior iOS software releases before 10.0.

Workaround to Delete ALL eMail in iOS 10

Another workaround allows deleting all emails in iOS 10 as well, but it should be stressed this is indeed a workaround and it is nonspecific in that literally every single email will be deleted from the iPhone or iPad in the process.

Do not attempt this without a backup or unless you are absolutely certain you never want those emails again, every single email will be deleted from the device whether it is read or unread:

Open the inbox and then tap on "Edit"
Tap on any message on screen so the checkbox appears next to it
Now press and hold the "Move" button with one finger, and while holding the "Move" button, uncheck the message you previously checked
Now release the "Move" button
You'll now be at the Inbox selection screen, at the top of the screen will show how many emails are selected, choose the "Trash" icon to move them all to trash and permanently delete them

This is an old workaround to delete every single email from Mail from long ago that continues to work with iOS 10 on iPhone and iPad. It is unforgiving and literally deletes every email from every account on the iPhone so be certain you wish to do that.

Know of another way to delete all email in iOS 10 on an iPhone or iPad? Let us know in the comments.