What is the Promotions tab in Gmail?

Last reviewed: October 10, 2026 · Markdown version

It is one of the five inbox categories Gmail sorts mail into when your inbox type is set to Default, and Google's one-line definition of it is "Deals, offers, and other promotional emails." The other four are Primary, Social, Updates and Forums (Organize your emails into categories, read 10 October 2026). Nothing is deleted or hidden for good by being sorted there; the tab is a view onto mail that is still in your account. What follows is what changes for a message once it lands in that tab, how to get the tab on each device, and the three documented reasons it can disappear. Why a particular email ended up there is a separate question, answered on why emails go to Promotions.

What changes for mail sorted into it

No alert on arrival. The categories page says that when new-mail notifications are on, "you only get notifications about messages in the “Primary” category." A sale email in Promotions arrives silently.
Some newer Gmail features skip it. Google's AI Inbox, a beta offered only "in the US and in English" on paid AI plans, "Only surfaces information from messages in your “Primary” tab and not other tabs, such as “Social” or “Promotions.”" (Manage to-dos & topics with AI Inbox, read 10 October 2026).
It still uses storage. Google counts "Gmail messages and attachments, which includes your Spam and Trash folders" toward the shared quota, with no exception for any tab (How your Google storage works, read 10 October 2026).
Archiving takes it out of the tab. "Archived emails don’t appear in categories"; they are under All Mail instead (the categories page above).

To list everything the tab holds in one search, Google's operator is category:promotions, which works "If you use inbox categories" (Refine searches in Gmail, read 10 October 2026).

How to get the tab

The tab exists only under the Default inbox type. On a computer: Settings, then in Quick settings under "Inbox type" choose Default, click Customize, tick Promotions, and Save. Google's inbox tips describe what happens at that moment: "if you turn on the Promotions tab, Gmail moves any existing promotional email from your inbox to the Promotions tab. Any new promotional messages go directly to the Promotions tab." (Tips to optimize your Gmail inbox, read 10 October 2026). So expect a much shorter inbox right after you switch it on.

In the Android app the path is Menu, Settings, your account, Inbox type, Default Inbox, then Inbox categories (Organize your emails into categories, Android, read 10 October 2026). On iPhone and iPad it is Menu, Settings, Inbox type, Default Inbox, back to Settings, then Inbox customizations and Inbox categories (the iPhone & iPad version, read 10 October 2026). Both phone pages carry a side effect worth knowing: "“Updates” may be enabled if the “Primary,” “Social,” and “Promotions” categories are on", so a fourth tab can appear with it.

Why the tab can vanish

Google's pages document three causes, and each has its own fix:

The inbox type changed. Categories belong to Default; the categories page says "To turn off categories, change your inbox type." Any of the other types (Important first, Unread first and the rest) shows no tabs. The full list is on changing your inbox type.
Promotions was unticked. It is one checkbox among the categories, set per device in the steps above.
The inbox is too big. On a computer, "If you have more than 250,000 emails in your inbox, you can’t use the “Default” inbox type." The phone pages word the same limit as "you can’t turn on inbox categories." Google's remedy on all three: "delete or archive your emails."

One look that is not a disappearance: in the Gmail app the categories are not drawn as tabs across the top. Google's Android layout page says that with Default, the inbox is "split up into different sections in the Menu" (Change your Gmail inbox layout, Android, read 10 October 2026). Open the menu and Promotions is listed there.

Living with it, or emptying it

The tab collects; it never clears itself. If it has turned into years of offers from shops you no longer use, clearing the whole tab covers the select-all route in Gmail. If you want to keep a few shops and drop the rest, Adinand Email Cleaner lists your Gmail by sender, so each shop's backlog is a single row you keep or send to Gmail's Trash, and its Unsubscribe uses whichever method that sender offers. Its limits apply here as everywhere: it moves mail to Trash rather than deleting it outright, so the space will free up after Trash clears, and it cannot change which tab Gmail chooses for future mail.