The iPhone Mail app now has an unsending feature.
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A new iOS 16 feature lets you ‘unsend’ emails you’ve sent through your iPhone’s default Mail app.
After sending an email, you’ll have about 10 seconds to unsend it, but you can change this to be longer.
Most email apps give you a small grace period after you send an email, where you can “unsend” the email and stop it from arriving in anyone else’s inbox.
After years of requests, this feature is finally coming to the default Mail app on your iPhone too. Here’s how it works, and how to unsend any email on your iPhone.
Important: The ability to unsend emails in the default Mail app is being added in iOS 16, the next big update coming to iPhones. iOS 16 won’t be officially available until the Fall, but you can download the iOS 16 beta and start using it right now.
How to unsend an email in the iPhone Mail app
First, open the Mail app and write your email. When you’re done, tap the blue arrow icon in the top-right corner to send it.
The email writing page will close. But at the bottom of the screen, you’ll now see a small button that says Undo Send.
Tap “Undo Send” when it appears.
Apple; William Antonelli/Insider
By default, the Undo Send button will appear for about 10 seconds after you’ve sent your email. Tap it to unsend the email. The writing page will pop up again to let you edit your email however you want, or just delete it.
If the 10 seconds pass without you doing anything, Undo Send will disappear and your email will send. After that, there’s no way to take it back.
How to change the amount of time you have to unsend an email
10 seconds is the Undo Send button’s default timer. But you can make this timer longer (or turn the feature off, if you ever wanted to).
Open your iPhone’s Settings app and scroll down to tap Mail. Then scroll down and select the Undo Send Delay option.
“Undo Send Delay” is the last option.
Apple; William Antonelli/Insider
You can now choose whether you want the Undo Send timer to be 10 seconds, 20 seconds, or 30 seconds long. If you tap Off, it’ll disable the unsending feature, so all your emails will send immediately but you can’t undo them.
Quick tip: This feature is new to the standard iPhone Mail app, but it’s been part of third-party apps like Gmail for years. To unsend an email in other apps, look for an Undo button after sending the message.