Advanced Gmail Service

The Advanced Gmail service allows you to use the Gmail API in Apps Script. Much like Apps Script's built-in Gmail service, this API allows scripts to find and modify threads, messages, and labels in a Gmail mailbox. In most cases, the built-in service is easier to use, but this advanced service provides a few extra features and access to more detailed information about Gmail content.

Note: This is an advanced service that must be enabled before use.

Reference

For detailed information on this service, see the reference documentation for the Gmail API. Like all advanced services in Apps Script, the advanced Gmail service uses the same objects, methods, and parameters as the public API.

Note: To improve performance, the Gmail API often restricts the amount of information returned from list requests to thread, message or label IDs and other simple information. More detailed information about a particular thread, message or label can be obtained by issuing a follow-up get request using the associated ID.

To report issues and find other support, see the Gmail support guide.

Sample code

The sample code below uses version 1 of the API.

List label information

The following example demonstrates how to list all the user's label information. This includes the label name, type, ID and visibility settings.

advanced/gmail.gs

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/**
 * Lists the user's labels, including name, type,
 * ID and visibility information.
 */
function listLabelInfo() {
  var response =
    Gmail.Users.Labels.list('me');
  for (var i = 0; i < response.labels.length; i++) {
    var label = response.labels[i];
    Logger.log(JSON.stringify(label));
  }
}

List inbox snippets

The following example demonstrates how to list text snippets assocated with each thread in the user's Inbox. Notice the use of page tokens to access the full list of results.

advanced/gmail.gs

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/**
 * Lists, for each thread in the user's Inbox, a
 * snippet associated with that thread.
 */
function listInboxSnippets() {
  var pageToken;
  do {
    var threadList = Gmail.Users.Threads.list('me', {
      q: 'label:inbox',
      pageToken: pageToken
    });
    if (threadList.threads && threadList.threads.length > 0) {
      threadList.threads.forEach(function(thread) {
        Logger.log('Snippet: %s', thread.snippet);
      });
    }
    pageToken = threadList.nextPageToken;
  } while (pageToken);
}

List recent history

The following example demonstrates how to log recent activity history. Specifically, this example recovers the history record ID associated with the user's most recently sent message, and then logs the message IDs of every message that has changed since that time. Each changed message is only logged once, no matter how many change events are in the history records. Notice the use of page tokens to access the full list of results.

advanced/gmail.gs

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/**
 * Gets a history record ID associated with the most
 * recently sent message, then logs all the message IDs
 * that have changed since that message was sent.
 */
function logRecentHistory() {
  // Get the history ID associated with the most recent
  // sent message.
  var sent = Gmail.Users.Threads.list('me', {
      q: 'label:sent',
      maxResults: 1
  });
  if (!sent.threads || !sent.threads[0]) {
    Logger.log('No sent threads found.');
    return;
  }
  var historyId = sent.threads[0].historyId;

  // Log the ID of each message changed since the most
  // recent message was sent.
  var pageToken;
  var changed = [];
  do {
    var recordList = Gmail.Users.History.list('me', {
      startHistoryId: historyId,
      pageToken: pageToken
    });
    var history = recordList.history;
    if (history && history.length > 0) {
      history.forEach(function(record) {
        record.messages.forEach(function(message) {
          if (changed.indexOf(message.id) === -1) {
            changed.push(message.id);
          }
        });
      });
    }
    pageToken = recordList.nextPageToken;
  } while (pageToken);

  changed.forEach(function(id) {
    Logger.log('Message Changed: %s', id);
  });
}