Hello,
I am experiencing an issue with the “Unread” Smart Folder behavior that is disrupting my workflow. There are two distinct symptoms regarding how read messages are handled in the view:
- Local Action: When I manually mark an email as read within eM Client, it does not immediately disappear from the “Unread” folder list. It remains visible until I manually change folders and return.
- External Sync: When I read an email on a different device (mobile/webmail), eM Client correctly syncs the status (the email un-bolds), but it remains listed in the “Unread” folder.
The expected behavior is that any message marked as read - whether locally or via sync - should be immediately removed from the Unread Smart Folder view.
Is there a configuration setting to force an immediate refresh of the Smart Folder list upon status change, or is this a bug in the current view logic?
That is by design. As @Gary advised in the following thread post, if eM Client automatically cleared the read messages after being read in the GUF, “it would be a cascade effect” where the next message would then be read and then automatically dissapear and so on.
So if you had a eg: long email you might not then get a chance to read it all and it dissapears after whatever X time you set in Settings / Mail / Read, and then you have to go and find it again.
So that’s why you need to click out of the unread global folder to clear the read messages.
That may change one day, but that’s how it works for now.
External Sync: When I read an email on a different device (mobile/webmail), eM Client correctly syncs the status (the email un-bolds), but it remains listed in the “Unread” folder.
If you are “still highlighted on the Unread folder at the time when the status is changed to read on another device”, you will also still normally “have to click to another folder and then click back to the Unread folder” to get it to change status, as it may not change status otherwise “depending on how long the read status takes to sync back to eM Client” from the server mailbox.
Hi,
Thanks so much for the fast reply! 
First, I thought that yes, that made sense, forget it then.
But then I thought that the solution isn’t to force the user to manually switch folders to refresh the view. The solution s “Hide on deselection.”
The logic should be:
- While the email is selected (focused): Even if it is marked as read, it stays visible in the list. This prevents the cascade effect and allows me to finish reading.
- The moment focus shifts to another email: The previous email (now read and deselected) is removed from the view.
Currently, eM Client seems to lack a “Refresh on deselection” trigger for Smart Folders. Implementing this would solve the annoyance without introducing the UX issues you described.
Regarding the External Sync issue: The cascade argument does not apply here. If I read an email on my phone, that email is likely not currently selected/focused in eM Client on my desktop. Therefore, when the sync happens, it should be removed from the Unread folder immediately, as there is no risk of interrupting my reading.
We are asking for the view to be dynamic based on focus context, rather than static until a manual folder switch.