Downloaded Google Takeout? Here's what to do with the MBOX file

Step 1: find the right file in the zip

A Takeout export unzips into a folder called Takeout, with one subfolder per Google product you selected. Your email is in Takeout/Mail/. Everything else in the zip can be ignored for reading mail.

File	What it is
All mail Including Spam and Trash.mbox	Your Gmail. Every message, with attachments, in one file. This is the one to open.
User Settings/	Filters, signature, forwarding and other settings, in small text and JSON files. Not email.
archive_browser.html	Google's index of what is in the export. It lists files; it does not show your messages.
Other folders	Drive, Photos, Calendar and so on, if you selected them.

Step 2: why it's one giant file

MBOX is an old, simple format: every message is written one after another into a single plain-text file, with its attachments encoded inside it. Google uses it because almost every mail program can read it. The downside is size. A mailbox that is 15 GB in Gmail is a single 15 GB file on your disk, and most programs try to load the whole thing at once, which is why they freeze or crash.

This viewer reads the file a few kilobytes at a time instead. It indexes the file once, which takes a few minutes for a very large export, and after that it opens immediately.

Step 3: what happened to your labels

Gmail labels are not folders, so Takeout doesn't turn them into folders. If you exported all mail, each message is written once and its labels are kept in a header inside the message called X-Gmail-Labels. That is why everything sits in one file.

If you only want certain labels, go back to Takeout, click All Mail data included under Mail, and pick just the labels you need. You get a smaller export that only contains that mail, which is often the easiest way to deal with one project or one client.

Step 4: open, search and export it

1. Open the .mbox file on the homepage. Use desktop Chrome or Edge. Your browser reads the file where it is. It is not copied and not uploaded.
2. Search an old Gmail export. Type a sender, address or subject. Narrow it with a date range: one year, one month, or any window you set. Turn on conversation view to group replies into threads the way Gmail does.
3. Export what you need. CSV for Excel or Google Sheets, a PDF archive, original .eml files, a smaller .mbox, or every attachment in one ZIP.

Reading, searching and filtering are free for files up to 50 GB, and you can export single messages for free. Bulk export and attachment extraction are a one-time $29 unlock, with no subscription.

Haven't exported yet?

1. Go to takeout.google.com and click Deselect all, then tick only Mail.
2. Choose all mail or specific labels with the All Mail data included button.
3. Pick the file size. Choose the largest size (50 GB) so the mail arrives as one archive rather than many. Leave the file type as .zip unless you know you want .tgz.
4. Create the export and wait. Google emails you a download link. It can take minutes for a small account and days for a big one. The download link only works for a limited time, so download the files when the email arrives.

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