How to Stop Category Filtering in Your Android Emails for a Simpler Inbox Experience

Google’s Messages app—which is the default SMS app on many Android devices—has “Categories” across the top to organize your text messages. Thankfully, this email-like feature can be turned off if it’s not your cup of tea.

Since March 2022, Messages shows three “Categories” at the top of the inbox: “All,” “Personal,” and “Business.” You don’t have to do any manual sorting. Google automatically attempts to sort your messages into these categories.

If this feature sounds familiar, that’s because it’s very similar to the categories in Gmail . You may not find it as useful for SMS. Let’s get rid of it.

Related: How to Remove Tab Categories in Gmail

First, open the Messages app and tap your profile icon in the top right.

Select “Messages Settings” from the menu.

Go to “Message Organization” in the settings.”

Toggle off the switch for “View Messages by Category.”

Unfortunately, you must have this enabled if you want to use the “Auto-Delete OTPs After 24 Hrs “ feature found on this same screen.

That’s all there is to it. Your inbox will be back to the typical layout without any categories at the top of the screen. Messages has some other organization features that you can use to keep things neat and easy to find.

Related: How to Pin Text Message Conversations on Android

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