How to Automatically Remove a Large Email Attachment
Most free email programs and services have a strict storage limit, and large attachments reach that limit quickly. To preserve storage space for important emails, it is best to remove attachments from your inbox entirely. While there is no way to set up automatic deletion of attachments in most email clients, deleting large attachments is a simple task with a few additional tools.
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Instructions
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Access your Gmail account, and click the "Settings" link in the top right corner. Select the "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" tab, and then scroll down until you find the "IMAP Access" section. Click the radio button beside "Enable IMAP," and save your changes.
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Download IMAPSize (see Resources). Double-click the downloaded file, and follow the installation prompts. Enter relevant information including your account name and password, as well as the IMAP forwarding address.
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Double-click the "Inbox" folder in the folder tree that appears. Select "Advanced Search" under filtering options, and configure the drop-down menus to read as "Size" and then "is greater than." Enter a value in bytes to sort attachments by file size.
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Check the box next to attachments you wish to delete, and then right-click and select "Save attachments locally." Choose a path on your hard drive by clicking the "..." button. Click the "Save selected attachments" button to back up your files.
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Select the "Delete attachments" option to send the selected attachments to the "Trash" folder, saving a copy of the original message, sans attachment, in your inbox. Click the "Expunge this mailbox" button if you wish to permanently delete the attachments.
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Tips & Warnings
You can find the IMAP address in the "Help" section of your email provider's website. For most services, it is simply "imap.servicename.com," for example, "imap.gmail.com."
Always save virus-free attachments to your hard drive before deleting them permanently from your inbox.
