Wildcard search in Gmail

Question

Is wildcard search possible in Gmail?

Answer 1

You can use Perl regex in both the find and filters if you wrap it in a forward slash.

from:(/(\@hp\.com$)/)

Will match everything from the hp.com domain.

It gets complicated very quickly because you have to escape certain characters.

Here's one I use that matches multiple address and compresses several rules down to one:

from:(/(^(discship|info)\@netflix\.com$)|(\@(engage|email)\.xbox\.com$)/)
Apply filter Media

That will label notification emails matching:

discship@netflix.com
info@netflix.com
ANYTHING@engage.xbox.com
ANYTHING@email.xbox.com

Answer 2

No it is not possible. However, it depends on what you need it for. Gmail uses a very limited form of stemming based on whole words.

For example, let's see if I can retrieve emails from phwd.lastname@gmail.com

from:phwd - works

from:pwhd.l - nope

from:phw - nope

So the closest you will get in this case, is if the person was nice enough to cut their first name and last name by the period.

so phwdlastname@gmail.com will result in all of the above searches not working.

But say I was nice to fill out my contact information and have my display name as "phwd lastname" then I can at least retrieve it this way

from:"phwd"

from:"phwd lastname"

It sucks but at least we have Gmail Ninjas .

Answer 3

According to Berkeley Lab Commons:

Gmail search does not implement sub-string, partial word, wildcard, or regular expression searching.

Your only alternative is narrowing things down with Advanced Search or trying multiple, simultaneous options in the search box

Answer 4

A bit easier, just write the following in the search box:

from: (*@mysite.com)

Answer 5

Wildcards are not officially supported in Gmail, even if they are supported in Google Search.

That said, I have been using wildcards to match hostnames and subject lines, and I have been doing this for 5+ years. However, since wildcards are an unsupported feature, the behavior changes from time to time. Filters that once worked will stop working after Google changes Gmail. In addition, filters used with Gmail in Google Apps may work differently then filters in standard Gmail (outside of Google Apps).

The following examples work for me in Gmail for Google Apps.

For example, until Oct 2012 I was able to use the following search to match emails sent with the from line of "example@example.org" or "example@*.example.org" (where the latter was email sent directly from root@host.example.org, for example).

from:(example@example.org OR example@*.example.org)

But in October 2012 this filter suddenly broke. But now I can use the following search with the same results:

from:example*example.org

Also, I can use a wildcard in the subject line. The following filter will match emails with a subject like: [jefferson-school-pta] Important information from school principal:

subject:(jefferson-*)

Answer 6

No, it's not possible. The search in Gmail does not allow substring search.

Answer 7

Here is Google's Advanced Search Tips page: http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=8931&topic=41

In general there is no need for a wild card. You can simply search for 2 word or word parts with a space in between them and you will get any emails that contain the 2 words whether they are both found within the same word or not.