Make the Windows 8 Mail app sync and notify Gmail labels

My Windows 8 Mail app is connected with Gmail, and is set to sync emails and download emails on arrival.

Most of my mail isn't going to the inbox, but is going straight to different labels. Say, all work related mail is going straight to the label Work.
The problem is that when I have unread email in Work, the Mail app will not tell me. It will only display a label, Work, I can click on, not Work (1) indicating unread mails. When clicking the label, I will need to wait for some time for it to actually download and sync the mail before anything shows. Even if I tried force syncing just before.

So:
The Mail app is not syncing my labels, and will not give any visuals that a label contains unread mail. Is there any way to achieve this?

Without it, the Mail app is unfortunately pretty useless to me.

Matsemann

Posted 2012-11-06T18:09:22.687

Reputation: 2 358

1So what is your question? Even Outlook doesn't really support Gmail Labels. – Ramhound – 2012-11-06T19:53:23.763

@Ramhound I want it to sync my labels and tell me if a label got unread mail. – Matsemann – 2012-11-06T19:58:39.130

This tells me the application in question does not support GMail's label system. – Ramhound – 2012-11-06T20:22:28.893

@Ramhound it supports the labels, it will just not sync them. See Zhaphs answer. – Matsemann – 2012-11-06T22:31:27.607

Answers

The mail app is using the concept of Folders, which Gmail ditched some time ago mostly because they limit you to a 1-1 mapping, but also apparently because you can't search in them.

However, the Labels that I've created are appearing in the left hand column of the mail app, with "unread" counts:

A label with unread items

These will not however be flagged on the live tile of the mail app as they aren't in your "inbox" - by filtering them out of there they are considered less important I guess.

This seems to be pretty standard for most MS mail clients, Outlook does exactly the same thing if you set up rules to move items out of the inbox as they arrive - you won't get the popup toast, nor the notification icon.

Zhaph - Ben Duguid

Posted 2012-11-06T18:09:22.687

Reputation: 920

Thanks for your answer. It seems you are right, after trying some more I'm able to get the right side to tell me I got unread mail. Will not notify me or update the tile as you said, however, which is sad. Well, well. – Matsemann – 2012-11-06T23:03:16.130

You said it yourself:

Without it, the Mail app is unfortunately pretty useless to me.

The mail app doesn't support labels or many other Gmail features. You'll have to wait for an official Gmail app.

Caleb Jares

Posted 2012-11-06T18:09:22.687

Reputation: 2 629

The mail app does support labels - see my screenshot for an example - it just won't highlight items in them on the live tile, as they aren't in the "inbox" - just as it does with folders. – Zhaph - Ben Duguid – 2012-11-06T20:53:12.427

1@Zhaph-BenDuguid Ah, good answer. – Caleb Jares – 2012-11-06T23:19:04.707