Before you start
MailNotes saves the emails you choose, one at a time, and that is the idea: only what really matters goes into Notion, not everything that arrives. It does not sync your inbox or save anything automatically. If you need everything to arrive automatically, see the Notion Mail alternatives.
What you need
- Gmail in Google Chrome.
- A Notion account with permission to create databases.
- About 5 minutes.
Step 1: set up your Notion database
Manual option: create a database with properties like these. The names are a guide: MailNotes reads the columns you already have and fills in the ones it recognizes.
| Property | Type | What it stores |
|---|---|---|
| Name | Title | The email subject |
| Sender | Text | The sender's name |
| The sender's email address | ||
| Creation Date | Date | The email date |
| Reminder | Date | A deadline detected by AI or entered by you |
| URL | URL | The link to the email in Gmail |
| Status | Status | For example: Not started, In progress, Done |
| Done | Checkbox | To mark it as completed |
You can add your own columns, such as amount, customer, or label. If the column name makes it clear what data you want, MailNotes will try to fill it with information from the email.
Step 2: install MailNotes and connect your account
- Install MailNotes from the Chrome Web Store. Pin it to the Chrome toolbar using the puzzle icon so it is always within reach.
- Click the MailNotes icon to open the panel and sign in with Google. Google will show you the permissions the extension requests before you continue, and you can revoke them at any time from your account.
- Connect your Notion account when the panel asks you to.
Step 3: share the database with MailNotes
This is the step people most often miss. When you connect Notion, a screen appears where you choose which pages and databases to grant access to. Select the database from step 1.
If you later see the error “No accessible databases found,” this step is missing. To fix it, open Notion and go to Settings → Connections → MailNotes → Manage access and add the database. You can also disconnect and reconnect Notion from the extension to repeat the authorization.
Step 4: save your first email with Quick Save
- Open an email in Gmail and click the MailNotes icon.
- In Save to, choose your database. The title is filled in with the subject, and you can change it.
- Click Quick Save.
- When it finishes, you will see “Saved to Notion” and a Open in Notion link to the page that was created.
Quick Save extracts the summary, tasks, and key details, and fills in your database properties. It uses one credit.
Step 5: review before saving (optional)
If you prefer to control the result:
- In What to extract, choose what you want: Summary, Tasks or Key Info. If you deselect all three, MailNotes only applies your instructions or a saved prompt.
- Enter instructions in Additional context, for example: “Extract the amount and due date.”
- If you want a date in the reminder, enter it in Reminder.
- Click Generate preview.
- In Review note you can edit the text and each detected property: sender, dates, and status.
- Click Save to Notion.
Saving after reviewing does not use another credit: the preview already used it. If you are not happy with the summary, Retry generation generates another version and uses one more credit.
Step 6: emails with PDFs
If the email has a PDF attachment, MailNotes reads its contents and uses them for the summary and key details. This is useful for invoices, reports, and contracts.
For example, with an invoice you can enter Additional context: “Extract the amount and due date.” If your database has a column with a clear name such as “Amount,” MailNotes will try to fill it in. With the Pro plan, you can save that instruction as a prompt (up to 10) and apply it with one click.
Step 7: recreate your inbox in Notion
Once you have saved some emails, create views in your database to recreate an inbox:
- To do: filter where Status equals “Not started.”
- This week: filter by Reminder within the current week.
- By sender: group by Sender.
A useful habit: at the end of the day, save only the emails that require an action or a decision. The rest can stay in Gmail. The more selective you are, the more useful your database will be.
What to expect
- It is manual by design. You decide which emails to save, so your database contains what matters.
- Gmail in Google Chrome only.
- Credits: the free plan includes 10 per month. Pro costs €5 per month with no limit. One credit is an AI analysis of an email.
- Privacy: the email content is sent in encrypted form to our server and to OpenAI to generate the summary, and is then written to your Notion. We do not store your emails.
If something goes wrong
- Your database does not appear: repeat step 3.
- The panel says “Open Gmail to start” or “Open an email”: MailNotes works inside a Gmail tab with an email open.
- Another problem: email mailnotes@mailnotes.es and we will look into it.