What you are paying a sorter for is an inbox that holds only the mail that needs you, every day, including the busy ones. Sortmail charges one flat price for that. Sorting new mail is unlimited, every feature is on the one plan, and the number on your invoice does not depend on how much mail other people decide to send you.
Two ways sorters charge more than they seem to
Tools that use a language model to sort email have a real cost for every message the model reads. Some pass it straight on as credits. Others split features across tiers, so the plan you first see is not the plan you end up on.
How credit metering usually works
- A monthly allowance of messages or credits included in the plan.
- A cost per message, or per model call, taken from that allowance.
- Extra charges for heavier operations, such as re-sorting old mail or summarising threads.
- Top-up packs, or an automatic overage charge, when the allowance runs out.
- A pause in sorting, or a fall-back to basic rules, if you do neither.
The headline price only tells you what a month costs if it stays inside the allowance.
How feature tiers usually work
A tiered sorter sells a basic plan with a few features and keeps the rest, such as the digest, more folders or a second account, for higher tiers. Some also need weeks of training before they sort well, so you pay for the learning period before you see the result. Sortmail has one plan with every feature, and your last month is sorted on day one, before you pay anything.
Step 1: measure your own volume
You need one number: how many messages reach your inbox in a typical month. In Gmail, search for:
in:inbox newer_than:7dThe count shows at the top right of the list. If it says "many", search a single day and multiply:
in:inbox newer_than:1dMultiply a week by four and a bit, or a day by thirty. Then estimate your busiest month, the one with a launch, a move or the holidays. The busy month decides what a metered plan really costs.
Step 2: price it against your numbers
- Compare the metered plan’s allowance with your typical month and your busy month.
- Add the top-ups or overage you would need for each.
- Add anything else that draws on credits: re-sorting after you change a category, bulk clean-ups, a second mailbox.
- Check which tier includes every feature you want, and use that tier’s price.
- Compare the total over a year with a flat price for the same number of mailboxes.
The cost that does not show on the invoice
Metering changes how you use a tool. When every message costs something, it is natural to exclude senders to save credits, put off a re-sort, or turn the tool off in a busy week. Each is a sensible decision about money and a poor one about your inbox. A flat price removes the decision: you know in January what the whole year costs.
Why Sortmail can charge a flat price
A flat price for unlimited sorting only works if most messages do not need a model at all. That is how Sortmail is built. Every message is checked against your rules and corrections first; if one matches, that decides it, with no model call. If none matches, Sortmail looks at the headers: a mailing-list header marks a newsletter, and an automated-sender header marks system mail. Only when neither settles it does a language model read a short, masked extract.
Bulk and automated mail usually carries those headers, so it never reaches the model, and every correction you make is another rule for that sender. That is what makes "unlimited" a promise we can afford to keep.
What is and is not unlimited
Sorting new mail is unlimited on every plan: no message cap, no credits, no throttle. What is managed is re-reading mail that has already been sorted. Full backfills run one at a time, on their own queue so they never hold up new mail, and more than five in 24 hours pauses further backfills for 24 hours. Sorting of new mail carries on regardless. Renaming a category, adding a rule or recolouring anything never re-reads your mailbox and is never limited. The fair use policy sets this out in full.
What the one plan includes
- Unlimited sorting of new mail on one mailbox, Gmail or Outlook.
- Five categories to start, renamable, and up to 8 in all.
- Your own rules, and corrections that become rules for that sender.
- The reason and confidence behind every decision.
- The daily digest, at the hour you choose.
- Extra mailboxes at $4.49 a month at the founding price, sharing the same categories, rules and digest.
One plan, with every feature in it: $8.99 a month, $79 a year or $139 for 2 years at the founding price, limited to the first 500 subscribers and locked for as long as the subscription runs. A year costs less than 9 months of monthly, and 2 years less than 16. After the founding seats it is $12.99 a month, $99 a year or $169 for 2 years. Cancel in one click in Billing.
Connect a mailbox and Sortmail sorts the last 30 days of your inbox (up to 1,000 messages) free, showing where each message would go and why. It is a preview rather than a trial: nothing is written to your mailbox, no labels and no archiving, until you choose a plan. You judge it on your own mail before you pay anything.