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I posted an ad on a website and when people respond, I get an email from [email protected] titled like this:

Reply to your "1999 Pontiac Sunfire - As Is" ad on Example.com

If two people reply to my advert in one day, I get two of these from the same bot sender and they end up in the same Gmail conversation, even though they're really from two different people.

Is it possible for me to "split" this conversation into two or more conversations so that I can keep track of which people I've replied to and who I have not?

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  • 2
    The accepted answer is inaccurate, there is a way. See hpmc's answer below.
    – Eric Hu
    Commented Jan 19, 2015 at 20:45
  • 1
    Especially crappy if Gmail for some reason groups together unrelated messages from distinct people. :-/
    – yo'
    Commented Oct 4, 2016 at 14:02

8 Answers 8

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37

Unfortunately it is not possible to split Gmail threads. However, you can mark some messages as "unread from here". When you reply, change the title and reply in a new composing window, so that at least the follow-ups are split.

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  • 3
    See my answer below, it is actually possible now.
    – aloo
    Commented Aug 14, 2014 at 21:15
15

You can also turn off conversation view, which is a new Gmail feature as of today:

http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2010/09/turn-off-gmails-conversation-view.html

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  • 7
    This helps somewhat, as you can at least label the messages individually, but once you turn conversation view back on(my problem isn't with the view but the fact these messages have nothing to do with each other), they still get collapsed together and come up in each other's label results.
    – Su'
    Commented Jun 4, 2011 at 21:35
13

You could always forward the conversation to yourself with a new subject. You'll lose the original sender, but you can add that to the message body so it's still searchable.

Also don't forget to include attachments when replying (if you want to keep them) enter image description here

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  • 5
    better yet, edit the subject line to add the sender's name
    – moioci
    Commented Jul 20, 2010 at 6:05
  • 1
    Shame it's not possible to do this automatically in a filter.
    – jez
    Commented Apr 27, 2016 at 15:08
  • This really should be the accepted answer...
    – Mark
    Commented Apr 4, 2021 at 21:06
12

When replying you can change the subject, that will push the conversation from that point forward to a new conversation.

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10

We (Streak) just added the ability to split up threads into smaller ones by selecting messages you want to move to a new thread. If you're still looking for this feature it may be helpful: https://www.streak.com/split-gmail-conversation-threads-break

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  • 5
    Is the split done by Streak also visible in a regular GMail app on iOS/Android?
    – yurkennis
    Commented Nov 18, 2014 at 20:55
  • @yurkennis I have checked that the split is also visible in the Gmail app on iOS, it works by altering the Subject field.
    – Melebius
    Commented Oct 3, 2016 at 18:49
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    Streak changes the date of the newest email among the emails you select to split off. To circumvent this, reply to yourself, and select that reply to be split off together with the other emails you want to split off. Then you can delete that reply. (A future version of Streak might automatize this workaround.)
    – root
    Commented Aug 7, 2018 at 10:32
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    Update: Apparently instead of fixing this problem, it got worse: my aforementioned workaround currently doesn't seem to work. @aloo Please at least reverse it to the way it used to work, thanks! And in any case thanks for creating Streak!
    – root
    Commented Apr 5, 2021 at 9:59
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    "Sorry, Streak currently only supports Google Chrome, Safari, and Microsoft Edge."
    – Zom-B
    Commented May 10, 2021 at 11:59
9

Yes, you can split conversations using a regular IMAP-client. Move one of the two messages to a different folder (label) using the IMAP-client and then move it back to the original folder (label).

If you set the draft flag in your external IMAP-client you can also edit the message to add keywords etc.

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    Just tried it with Mail.app under OS X Mavericks 10.9.3, and it doesn't work. Could you give step-by-step instructions to follow that give the result as of now?
    – yurkennis
    Commented Jun 11, 2014 at 13:56
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    I used Mulberry to do this. It is a free download. Have never tried with Mail.app. Mulberry has some learning curve so maybe you should try with Thunderbird first.
    – d-b
    Commented Jun 12, 2014 at 14:49
-3

Click on the cog icon and scroll down to and click on settings. Scroll down to "conversation view" and click to turn it off. Save at the bottom, log out then log back in and all of your emails will be separated regardless of subject :)

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  • Perhaps you can show us, with a screenshot, where the cog exactly is?
    – Jacob Jan
    Commented May 23, 2013 at 11:34
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    Thank you for your suggestion, but this answer already suggested turning off conversation view.
    – ale
    Commented May 23, 2013 at 12:41
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    This doesn't answer the question. The OP wants to split a thread - implementation merely turns off conversation view Gmail-wide, which will affect all threads, not just the one the OP wants to split.
    – Luke
    Commented Apr 16, 2020 at 1:13
-5

Log into your Gmail.

Settings Tab

Simply click on the Settings Tab (Cog shaped wheel) as per the image above, then click on Settings. Scroll down to "Conversation View", select conversation view "On" button.

Scroll to bottom of screen and click on "Save Changes" tab.

You're done!

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  • 10
    I don't think this answers the question. The OP wants to "split" a SPECIFIC conversation, not disable conversation view completely.
    – Vidar S. Ramdal
    Commented Oct 9, 2013 at 9:10
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    Also, even if that was what they wanted, this is about turning it on, not off...
    – lindes
    Commented Sep 24, 2014 at 15:27

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