Yahoo Mail gets in-box filtering by contact

Yahoo has added a small but useful feature to its Web mail service that lets users filter the contents of their in-box to see only the messages from their contacts. This means that if someone's not on your contacts whitelist, you don't see their message.

Short of Yahoo Mail's built-in filters and its connections sorting, this is one of the simpler ways to cut out any in-box clutter from people you don't know. However, there's some work involved on your part to build that list of contacts. To enable the feature, users must first create a Yahoo profile over at profiles.yahoo.com. Then add people they wish to list as contacts.

Besides sorting by connections, users will soon be able to sort by contacts. Here's what the in-box looks like before the sort.

(Credit: Yahoo )

And here's what it looks like after the sort.

(Credit: Yahoo)

One area where this terminology might confuse users is the difference between "contacts" and "connections." Yahoo Mail's help section refers to connections as "contacts with special status." In the case of mail, what makes them special is that you've interacted with them frequently, so the product assumes you know them. They must also confirm you as a contact before a connection is made. Contacts, on the other hand must be manually added, either through mail, or over on Yahoo's profiles site.

Yahoo Mail's senior product manager Rick Pal says this feature will only be available for Yahoo Mail users in the U.S. and Australia, and won't be rolling out to all accounts until a "few weeks" from now.

Update: Made a clarification on the difference between contacts and connections.

Previously: Yahoo puts meat on Open Strategy bones

[nrg.dude]

Opt-in should be the standard policy for ALL Internet related programs. It would kill spam.

Now what Yahoo! needs to add is making this Contacts only list into two parts: Friends and Friends+newsletters so you can see just people or all approved mail.

[ti99_forever]

And what was wrong by just filtering by your regular contact list in the first place, for all these years? And why must the contact also approve it? You are filtering in-coming mail, anyway.

Silly Yahoo! They still haven't grown up after all these years.

[ccdogpark]

Yeah this story must have some important details wrong or missing.

I have to use Yahoo emailclassic on my system
but it is much better than hotmail that I used to use.

[everythingsmagic]

Re: ti99_forever,

The story is incorrect. I've got this feature enabled on my account and you can filter by just your contact list that you already use. No need for approval by any contact. Its pretty simple, actually. Useful feature.

[hmdz105]

Any reason to use Yahoo mail yet?

1- Speed: Gmail
2- Productivity: Gmail
3- Features: Gmail
4- Ease of use :Gmail
5- Innovations and labs: Gmail
6- POP3 free: Gmail
7- Delivery time: Gmail
8- Anti-Spam technology: Gmail

What has Yahoo to do with e-Mail any way? They better set a date to shut down their mail service like what are doing to Yahoo 360!

[ccdogpark]

Gmail is a waste of time and so are you, get lost dirtbag.

WRZ

[jumpjetta]

@hmdz105

Yeah, you've pretty much nailed it. Yahoo does email??

[talking poo]

Contact button is missing on my Quick Filter bar

[Corpus Callosum]

I also don't have the Contact button, but I do have the "From Connections" button.

I have been waiting 8 years for this feature. Yahoo mail is completely useless to me without this. I get so much spam that I can't find real messages. I was hoping to go look through 8 years of real email when I read this story (stuff I could never find before). But, alas, no "contact" button.

Oh well. Maybe next decade.

Meanwhile, while we wait years for Yahoo to put a button to filter the millions of spam messages in our inboxes, google is getting ready to change the whole game. http://wave.google.com

[jumpjetta]

Who cares? Yahoo Mail has been useless for a long time now.

My yahoo account gets thousands of unfiltered spam messages a week, whereas GMail gets 1 or 2.

GMail can be used with IMAP and POP3 clients for free. Yahoo charges extra for that.

Why do people use Yahoo Mail??

[talking poo]

I have both Gmail and Yahoo, but YMail is my primary--with all my Gmail being forwarded to it.

A few reasons why I like Yahoo better:

1. The Layout. Being able to preview messages is great. Seems less cluttered than Gmail.

2. Tabs. Love having multiple messages opened.

3. Disposable e-mail address. Use this all the time when signing up to post on random forums. If I keep getting spam addressed to one addy, I simply delete it.

4. In-box Filtering. Once this gets up and running, it'll be a nice welcome.

Haven't been on Google for awhile so maybe they've added more to it. Regardless, Ymail fits my needs.

[JerryHoneycutt]

Here is some intersting video from youtube called "Registry Cleaners - Avoid Scams"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtdvY2jIDFY