SaneBox vs Clean Email: The Real Comparison You Need

Both SaneBox and Clean Email promise to clean up your inbox, but they take fundamentally different approaches. SaneBox works invisibly in the background using AI to auto-sort your messages. Clean Email gives you a separate interface with powerful bulk actions and manual control.

Neither is universally "better." The right choice depends entirely on how you prefer to manage email. This guide breaks down exactly what each tool does, how they differ, and which one fits your workflow.

Quick Verdict: Which Should You Choose?

Choose SaneBox if: You want a "set it and forget it" solution that learns your habits and works invisibly inside your existing email client. Best for people drowning in email who want AI to handle the sorting automatically.

Choose Clean Email if: You want hands-on control, need to clean up a massive backlog of old emails, or prefer to create explicit rules rather than trusting AI. Also better if you're on a tight budget.

Pricing Comparison

This is where things get interesting. The pricing structures are completely different, and one is significantly cheaper than the other.

SaneBox Pricing

Annual billing drops prices significantly: $59/year for Snack, $99/year for Lunch, $299/year for Dinner. There's also biyearly billing at $99, $169, and $499 respectively.

SaneBox offers a 14-day free trial with access to all features. Educational institutions, non-profits, and government agencies get 25% off.

Clean Email Pricing

Clean Email offers a free trial that lets you clean 1,000 emails and unsubscribe from 25 newsletters-no credit card required.

The Price Difference Is Huge

Let's be real: Clean Email is dramatically cheaper. At $29.99/year for one account versus SaneBox's $59/year minimum, you're paying roughly half. If you need multiple accounts, Clean Email's 5-account plan at $49.99/year beats SaneBox's 2-account Lunch plan at $99/year by a wide margin.

But here's the catch with SaneBox: you get what you pay for in terms of features per tier. The Snack plan only gives you 2 features to choose from. Want the full suite? You're paying $299/year for the Dinner plan. Clean Email gives you all features on every plan-the only variable is how many accounts you can connect.

Annual billing saves you about 75% compared to monthly on Clean Email, making it one of the best values in email management. SaneBox saves you about 20-30% with annual billing, which is decent but not as aggressive.

How They Actually Work (The Key Difference)

This is the most important distinction between these two tools.

SaneBox: The Invisible Assistant

SaneBox connects to your email via IMAP or Exchange and creates smart folders directly in your existing inbox. You never leave Gmail, Outlook, or whatever email client you use. It just works in the background.

The AI analyzes your email history and automatically sorts incoming messages. Important stuff stays in your inbox; everything else gets filed into folders like @SaneLater, @SaneNews, or @SaneBlackHole.

Training is dead simple: drag an email from one folder to another, and SaneBox learns from that behavior. Over time, it gets smarter about what you consider important. According to user reports, SaneBox shows good results within 2-3 days and reaches about 98.5% accuracy after 1-2 weeks of use.

The system analyzes 4-6 weeks of email history on setup for immediate baseline filtering, so you're not starting from scratch. It only processes email headers-sender, subject, timestamp-never the actual content of your messages.

Clean Email: The Dashboard Controller

Clean Email operates from its own separate interface-either a web app or mobile app. You're not working inside Gmail anymore; you're working in Clean Email's environment.

This gives you more visual control and powerful bulk operations. Need to delete 50,000 old promotional emails? Clean Email makes this easy with Smart Folders that automatically categorize emails by type: Social Networks, Online Shopping, Finance, Travel, Newsletters, and 28 more categories-33 in total.

Instead of AI learning your habits, you create explicit Auto Clean rules with specific conditions (sender, domain, age, size, read/unread status) and actions (Trash, Star, Archive, Move, Label, etc.).

Clean Email works immediately upon connection. There's no training period-it scans your email headers and metadata and organizes everything into Smart Folders automatically. You can start bulk-cleaning thousands of emails right away.

What Is SaneBox? A Deep Dive

SaneBox is an AI-powered email management service founded in 2010 in Boston. It's designed to work as an invisible layer on top of your existing email setup, filtering emails without requiring you to change how or where you check email.

The core philosophy is passive management: SaneBox makes decisions for you based on learned behavior, keeping your inbox focused on what matters while everything else gets organized into specialized folders.

SaneBox doesn't store emails on their servers. Instead, it connects to your email provider using secure protocols and processes header information only. The service is GDPR compliant and uses OAuth 2.0 authentication for security.

If your SaneBox account is inactive for 90 days, they automatically delete all your data-a privacy feature that shows their commitment to not holding onto your information unnecessarily.

How SaneBox AI Learning Works

SaneBox uses machine learning algorithms that analyze your email patterns. When you first connect, it examines several weeks of email history to understand:

The system continuously adapts based on your actions. Every time you move an email between folders, you're training the AI. You can use "Move and train to..." for permanent training or "Move once to..." for one-time actions without teaching the algorithm.

This adaptive learning means SaneBox gets better the longer you use it. Early on, you might need to correct some sorting decisions. After a few weeks, most users report the AI accurately predicts what they want to see in their inbox.

What Is Clean Email? A Deep Dive

Clean Email is a privacy-focused inbox management tool founded in 2014. It gained significant recognition in 2017 when it was highlighted as a trustworthy alternative to Unroll.me after that service was found selling user data.

Unlike SaneBox's AI approach, Clean Email focuses on giving users complete control through visual organization and rule-based automation. It's designed for people who want to see exactly what's happening with their emails and make conscious decisions about how to handle them.

Clean Email supports all major providers: Gmail (with OAuth), Outlook/Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, iCloud, AOL, Fastmail, Exchange, and any IMAP-compatible service. Like SaneBox, it only analyzes email headers and metadata-never content.

The service is GDPR and CCPA compliant with 128-bit encryption. They automatically delete data 45 days after account termination. 100% of Clean Email's income comes from subscription fees-they don't sell data or show ads.

How Clean Email's Smart Folders Work

Smart Folders are predefined filters that automatically organize your emails into logical categories. When you first connect an account, Clean Email scans all your messages and immediately groups them.

The 33 Smart Folders include categories like:

These folders update in real-time as new emails arrive. You can then select entire categories and apply bulk actions-delete all, archive all, move all, label all-with just a few clicks.

The visual interface shows you exactly how many emails are in each category, making it easy to spot where your inbox clutter is coming from.

Feature Comparison

Email Sorting and Filtering

SaneBox: Uses AI that learns from your behavior. Drag emails between folders to train it. The algorithm continuously adapts based on what you do. Works passively-you don't need to think about it once it's trained.

The main folders SaneBox creates include @SaneLater (non-urgent emails), @SaneNews (newsletters and bulk mail), @SaneBlackHole (permanently blocked senders), and custom folders you can create for specific needs like receipts, bills, or work projects.

Clean Email: Uses rule-based automation. You define exactly what happens with specific conditions and actions. More control, but requires more active management and upfront setup time.

Clean Email's Auto Clean rules can be incredibly detailed. You can set conditions like "from this domain," "older than 30 days," "larger than 10MB," "marked as read," and "not starred," then apply actions automatically. Rules run 24/7 once configured.

Unsubscribing and Blocking

This is where Clean Email has a real advantage.

SaneBox's SaneBlackHole: When you drag an email there, future emails from that sender automatically go to Trash. But here's the thing-it doesn't actually send an unsubscribe request. The sender keeps emailing you; you just don't see it. Emails stay in SaneBlackHole for 7 days before moving to Trash, giving you time to rescue anything accidentally blackholed.

Clean Email's Unsubscriber: Actually sends unsubscribe requests to senders. This is true unsubscribing, not just hiding emails. The system detects subscription emails and lets you bulk-unsubscribe from multiple lists at once. You can also block entire domains and subdomains, which is useful when spammers use multiple subdomains to evade filters.

Clean Email's Unsubscriber feature groups senders by subscription, shows you preview messages, and lets you multi-select several subscriptions to apply actions to all of them simultaneously. It's far more comprehensive for managing newsletter overload.

Follow-Up Reminders and Tracking

SaneBox: Has two powerful features here. SaneReminders lets you set a reminder for a specific email you want to be notified about-great for following up on important conversations. SaneNoReplies creates a folder that collects sent emails that haven't received a response, helping you track unreplied messages.

These features are especially valuable for salespeople, account managers, and anyone who needs to follow up on outgoing emails. You can set custom timeframes for reminders and check SaneNoReplies periodically to see what needs follow-up.

Clean Email: Doesn't have follow-up tracking features. This is a notable gap if you need help tracking unreplied emails or setting reminders for specific messages. Clean Email is focused on organizing and cleaning what's already in your inbox rather than managing outgoing correspondence.

Do Not Disturb Mode

SaneBox: Has a proper Do Not Disturb feature that temporarily holds all new emails in a separate folder. You can set it for:

There's even a VIP feature where certain people can break through Do Not Disturb by using a secret keyword in the subject line. You pick the keyword, share it with trusted contacts, and they can reach you even during blackout periods.

You can also set an auto-reply message that SaneBox sends automatically when Do Not Disturb is active, letting senders know when to expect a response.

Clean Email: Doesn't have an equivalent DND feature. You can use Auto Clean rules to automatically archive or move emails during certain periods, but there's no dedicated "pause my inbox" functionality.

Email Snoozing

Both tools let you snooze emails to deal with later, though they implement it differently.

SaneBox: Uses special folders for snoozing. You have @SaneTomorrow, @SaneNextWeek, or can create custom snooze folders like @Sane2Days or @Sane1Month. Drop an email in the folder, and it reappears in your inbox at the specified time. The snoozing happens within your existing email client-no separate interface needed.

Clean Email: Has a "Read Later" feature that works similarly. You move emails to Read Later, and Clean Email can send you a summary of Read Later messages on a schedule (daily or weekly). By default, summaries arrive on Sunday evenings, but you can customize the timing.

The key difference: SaneBox's snoozing is more granular with more time options, while Clean Email's Read Later is simpler but less flexible.

Bulk Cleanup

Clean Email: This is where it absolutely shines. It can process 100,000+ emails at once. User reports confirm people have successfully cleaned 300,000+ messages in a single session. The Smart Folders immediately categorize everything when you connect, letting you take mass actions on entire categories.

For example, you could:

The visual feedback is satisfying-you watch your inbox count drop in real-time as Clean Email processes thousands of messages.

SaneBox: Has Email Deep Clean for identifying large and old emails, but it's not as powerful for one-time massive cleanups. Deep Clean helps you review and delete space-consuming messages in bulk, but the focus is more on ongoing management than tackling a huge backlog.

SaneBox is designed to prevent future clutter, not necessarily fix years of accumulated mess. If you have 50,000 unread emails, Clean Email is the better tool for the initial cleanup.

Custom Folders and Organization

SaneBox: Lets you create custom DIY folders that the AI can learn to sort emails into. For example, you might create @SaneReceipts, @SaneBills, or @SaneFamily. Drag emails from those senders into the custom folders, and SaneBox learns to automatically route future messages there.

Custom folders are trainable just like the default SaneBox folders, giving you flexibility to organize emails however makes sense for your workflow.

Clean Email: Uses Smart Folders as the primary organization method, but you can also leverage your email provider's native labels and folders. Clean Email can apply labels (in Gmail) or move emails to existing folders (in Outlook) as part of Auto Clean rules.

The Favorites feature lets you customize any Smart Folder with your preferred filters and search terms, then save those settings as a favorite for quick access.

Attachment Management

SaneBox: Has SaneAttachments, which automatically saves email attachments to cloud storage services like Dropbox, Google Drive, Box, or OneDrive. You can set rules for which attachments to save and where they should go.

This is useful for automatically backing up important documents or organizing files without manually downloading and uploading them.

Clean Email: Has a Smart Folder for Large Attachments that helps you identify emails taking up storage space. You can bulk-delete these to free up quota, but Clean Email doesn't automatically save attachments to external services.

Email Provider Support

Both work with virtually all major email providers: Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, iCloud, AOL, and any IMAP-compatible account.

SaneBox has a slight edge here-it also supports EWS-OWA (Exchange Web Services) and ActiveSync, which can matter for certain enterprise setups using Microsoft Exchange servers.

Clean Email only supports IMAP-based accounts. If you're on older protocols like POP3 or have a custom enterprise setup that doesn't support IMAP, this could be a blocker.

Neither tool supports POP3, but most email providers can switch from POP3 to IMAP in settings if needed.

Platform and Device Support

SaneBox: Works wherever your email works since it operates server-side. You can check email on PC, Mac, desktop, mobile, tablet-anywhere. SaneBox also offers an iOS Companion App for mobile management.

The advantage is seamless integration. Whether you're using the Gmail web interface, Apple Mail on Mac, Outlook desktop app, or your iPhone's mail client, SaneBox folders appear and function identically.

Clean Email: Offers dedicated apps for web, macOS, iOS (iPhone and iPad), and Android. The mobile apps are fully featured, letting you manage your inbox from anywhere.

The trade-off is you need to open the Clean Email app to perform bulk actions and review Smart Folders. You can't do everything from within your native email client like you can with SaneBox.

Clean Email also supports multiple interface languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, and Ukrainian. SaneBox is English-only.

Account Limits

SaneBox maxes out at 4 email accounts on the top-tier Dinner plan. Need more? You have to contact their support team for enterprise pricing.

Clean Email supports up to 10 accounts on the highest plan, which is better for people managing multiple inboxes or small teams who want unified email management across several accounts.

For solopreneurs managing personal email plus multiple business domains, Clean Email's higher account limit is a significant advantage at a fraction of the cost.

Privacy and Security

Both tools claim strong privacy practices and don't sell your data.

SaneBox: Uses OAuth 2.0 authentication, never stores emails on their servers, only processes header data (sender, subject, timestamp)-not email content. GDPR compliant with SOC 2 Type II certification. If your account is inactive for 90 days, they delete all your data.

SaneBox's privacy policy explicitly states that customer data is never used as a source of revenue. They don't sell, share, or use your email information for any purpose other than providing the service.

Clean Email: Also doesn't read email content, processes headers only, uses full 128-bit encryption, no ads or tracking. The developer states they don't collect data from the app. GDPR and CCPA compliant with automatic data deletion 45 days after account termination.

Clean Email's business model is 100% subscription-based-they explicitly state in their privacy policy that they don't sell user data or use it for advertising.

Both are legitimate options if privacy matters to you. Neither is mining your emails for advertising or third-party data sales.

Clean Email's Privacy Monitor

Clean Email offers a unique Privacy Monitor feature that SaneBox doesn't have. Privacy Monitor regularly checks your email address against known data breaches, helping you stay informed about potential security risks.

If your email appears in a breach database, Clean Email alerts you immediately so you can take action-change passwords, enable two-factor authentication, monitor accounts for suspicious activity.

This proactive security feature adds value beyond just email organization, making Clean Email a more comprehensive privacy tool.

User Interface and Learning Curve

SaneBox: Almost no learning curve because it works inside your existing email client. You might not even notice it's there-which is the point. The trade-off is less visibility into what's happening behind the scenes.

The SaneBox dashboard (accessed via their website) lets you configure settings, view training history, and manage features, but you rarely need to visit it. Most interaction happens by dragging emails between folders in your inbox.

Some users note the dashboard with all the configuration options can be confusing initially, though it allows for fine-tuning your settings.

Clean Email: Has its own interface you need to learn. It's clean and modern, but switching contexts between your normal email and Clean Email's app can be jarring. Some users find the initial filter setup less intuitive than expected.

The interface is loaded with buttons and options, and it takes time to understand what they all do. However, the payoff is better visibility and control over exactly what's being done to your emails.

According to user reviews, Clean Email takes longer to set up initially compared to SaneBox, but offers more manual control once you understand how it works.

Screener Feature: Blocking Unknown Senders

Both tools offer screener features to prevent unknown senders from reaching your inbox, but they work differently.

Clean Email's Screener: Turns your inbox into an opt-in system. Unknown senders are held for review in a separate area. You periodically check screened messages and batch approve or block them. It's proactive spam prevention that stops unwanted mail before it clutters your inbox.

Screener is especially useful if you get a lot of cold outreach, first-time contact from potential clients, or unsolicited sales emails. Instead of these messages hitting your inbox and requiring individual decisions, they're queued for bulk review.

SaneBox's approach: SaneBox learns from your behavior which senders are important. New senders typically land in @SaneLater initially until you train the system by moving emails to your inbox. It's less of a hard gate and more of a soft filter based on AI predictions.

Clean Email's Screener is more explicit and gives you complete control, while SaneBox's approach is more passive and learns over time.

Mobile App Experience

SaneBox: Offers an iOS Companion App for iPhone and iPad. The app lets you review filtered emails, train the AI, and manage settings on the go. Since SaneBox works server-side, all your folders appear in any mobile email client you use.

The Companion App is useful but not essential-you can manage everything from within your phone's native email app by moving messages between folders.

Clean Email: Offers full-featured mobile apps for both iOS and Android. The apps mirror the web interface functionality, letting you bulk-clean emails, manage Auto Clean rules, unsubscribe from lists, and review Smart Folders from your phone or tablet.

Clean Email's mobile apps are more comprehensive than SaneBox's iOS companion, especially the Android support which SaneBox lacks entirely.

Customer Support

SaneBox: Offers email and chat support. Response times are generally good, with users reporting helpful assistance when needed. They also have an extensive help center with articles, tutorials, and FAQs.

During the 14-day trial, you get access to full support to help with setup and training questions.

Clean Email: Offers email support. Some users note that response times can be slower-around 2 days-but support does follow up with helpful answers. The help center includes articles on all features and setup guides.

No live chat is available, which can be frustrating if you need immediate help.

Cleaning Suggestions and Smart Recommendations

Clean Email: Offers Cleaning Suggestions based on two sources: similar messages that you have frequently cleaned, and similar messages that other users have frequently cleaned. This community-driven approach helps you discover cleanup opportunities you might have missed.

The AI-powered recommendations analyze your patterns and suggest actions, making it easier to maintain a clean inbox without constantly thinking about what needs attention.

SaneBox: Focuses more on the daily digest, which provides a summary of filtered emails with one-click actions. You can quickly review what's been sorted and make adjustments if needed.

The digest keeps you informed without overwhelming you-you see what SaneBox did and can correct any mistakes with a single click.

Daily Digest: Staying Informed

SaneBox: Sends a daily digest summarizing all emails that were filtered away from your inbox. The digest includes one-click actions for each filtered email-you can move it to inbox, delete it, or keep it where it is.

You can customize digest frequency: once daily, multiple times per day, hourly, or just on weekdays. The digest schedule adapts to your workflow.

This is one of SaneBox's most loved features because it provides visibility without requiring you to check filtered folders manually. You know exactly what you're missing (or not missing).

Clean Email: Offers two summary features. Action History Summary emails you a regular notification of all actions Clean Email has taken to keep your mailbox clean, including messages processed via Sender Settings, Unsubscriber, and Auto Clean Rules.

Read Later Summary sends you a summary of messages in your Read Later folder on a schedule (weekly by default on Sunday evenings, customizable to daily).

The difference: SaneBox's digest is interactive with one-click actions, while Clean Email's summaries are informational reports. You can't act directly from Clean Email's summary emails-you need to open the app.

Who Each Tool Is Best For

SaneBox Is Better For:

Clean Email Is Better For:

Real User Experiences

SaneBox User Feedback

Users consistently praise SaneBox for saving massive amounts of time. One verified user reported: "I used to spend at least 90 minutes a day on email, but now I spend less than 30 minutes, saving me over five hours per week."

Another long-term user said SaneBox "keeps my inbox at 0" and that it's become essential to their workflow. The training system gets particular praise-users appreciate that dragging emails between folders is all it takes to teach the AI.

Common complaints include the price point (users wish the full feature set were available at lower tiers) and the initial learning curve for the AI (it takes a few days to a week for accuracy to improve). Some users note that features like SaneNoReplies and SaneReminders can be confusing initially.

Clean Email User Feedback

Users love Clean Email for bulk cleanup power. One verified user cleaned "125,000+ email inbox down to zero" using the tool. Another said: "This app relieved me of that mess and simplified what would have otherwise been a mind-numbingly tedious, time-consuming task."

The Auto Clean and Block features get consistent praise, with users calling the Smart Views "amazing" for easily sorting emails with pre-created filters.

Common complaints include the learning curve for the interface ("My initial attempt to set up the filters was not as intuitive as I expected") and the fact that you need to leave your normal email client to use Clean Email's interface. Some users wish there were more features for ongoing email management rather than just cleanup.

Integration Ecosystem

SaneBox: Integrates with cloud storage services (Dropbox, Google Drive, Box, OneDrive) for automatic attachment saving. Also integrates with Azure Active Directory for enterprise single sign-on.

The focus is on working within your existing email ecosystem rather than replacing it. SaneBox plays nicely with whatever email client and workflow you already have.

Clean Email: Doesn't offer extensive third-party integrations. It's a standalone tool focused entirely on email organization and cleanup. The lack of integrations is intentional-Clean Email wants to be simple and focused rather than a sprawling platform.

For users who want attachment management or CRM integration, SaneBox has the edge.

Time Savings: What to Expect

SaneBox: Claims the average customer saves 12+ hours per month. User reports support this-people commonly report saving 1-2 hours per day on email management after the AI is trained.

The time savings come from not having to manually sort, not having to scan through irrelevant messages, and not having to decide what's important-the AI does it for you.

Clean Email: Time savings are front-loaded. You'll spend more time initially setting up Auto Clean rules and performing the first big cleanup, but once that's done, maintenance is minimal.

The company claims they helped users save about 100 years of collective time by cleaning 1.5 billion emails. The bulk cleanup capability means you can clear years of backlog in a single afternoon.

Which Has Better AI?

SaneBox clearly wins on AI sophistication. The adaptive learning system that gets smarter over time is the core value proposition. Clean Email doesn't claim to use AI for sorting-it's rule-based automation.

However, Clean Email does use AI for Cleaning Suggestions, recommending actions based on your patterns and what other users do with similar emails. It's more limited AI than SaneBox's comprehensive learning system.

If you want AI to manage your email automatically, SaneBox is the only real choice here. If you prefer explicit rules and manual control, Clean Email's approach is actually an advantage.

Onboarding Experience

SaneBox: Onboarding is straightforward. Connect your email account, grant permissions, activate desired features (on higher plans), and SaneBox starts working immediately. The service analyzes your email history and begins filtering within minutes.

You'll receive an email explaining which features you have activated and how to use them. Interactive onboarding slides walk you through the basics.

The initial accuracy is decent but improves significantly within the first week as you train the system.

Clean Email: Onboarding involves connecting your account and waiting for the initial scan to complete. For large inboxes (tens of thousands of messages), this can take some time.

Once scanning is complete, Smart Folders are populated and you can immediately start taking bulk actions. The initial setup for Auto Clean rules requires more thought-you need to decide what rules you want before creating them.

Some users report confusion during setup because they tried to use features before the initial scan completed, thinking they had to pay before the app would do anything. Wait for scanning to finish before judging functionality.

ROI: Is Either Tool Worth the Money?

SaneBox: If you're spending an hour per day on email (very common for professionals), and SaneBox saves you half that time, you're recovering 2.5 hours per week or about 10 hours per month. At $59/year for the Snack plan, that's $4.92 per month for 10 hours saved-$0.49 per hour saved.

For most professionals, that ROI is a no-brainer. Even at the Dinner plan ($299/year or $24.92/month), if you're saving 10-12 hours per month, it's worth it.

Clean Email: At $29.99/year ($2.50/month), the ROI is even more obvious. If you spend just one afternoon doing a major bulk cleanup that would have taken days manually, Clean Email has paid for itself for the year.

For ongoing time savings, the modest annual cost means even small efficiency gains justify the expense.

Deal Breakers: When NOT to Choose Each Tool

Skip SaneBox If:

Skip Clean Email If:

The Bottom Line

If you want hands-off, AI-powered email sorting that works invisibly inside your existing inbox-and you don't mind paying more for it-SaneBox is the way to go. Start with their 14-day free trial to see if the AI learns your preferences correctly. The time savings are real, and for busy professionals receiving 50+ emails daily, SaneBox pays for itself within the first month.

If you want more control, better bulk cleanup tools, true unsubscribing, and a significantly lower price tag, Clean Email is the smarter choice. Their free trial lets you clean 1,000 emails to test it out. For most users watching their budget, Clean Email at $29.99/year is hard to beat.

The reality is that both tools excel at different things. SaneBox is superior for ongoing automatic management with minimal effort. Clean Email is superior for one-time cleanup, bulk operations, and hands-on control.

For the absolute best email management setup? Use Clean Email first to do a massive cleanup of your backlog and unsubscribe from hundreds of newsletters. Then use SaneBox going forward for automatic sorting of new emails. The combination gives you both immediate cleanup power and long-term automatic maintenance.

But if you can only choose one, pick based on your primary pain point: Choose SaneBox for ongoing email overload, or Clean Email for accumulated mess and budget consciousness.

Try SaneBox Free for 14 Days →

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use both SaneBox and Clean Email together?

Yes, you can use both simultaneously. They don't conflict since SaneBox works server-side within your email client while Clean Email operates through a separate interface. However, this might be overkill for most users and adds unnecessary cost.

A better approach: use Clean Email for a one-time deep cleanup, then switch to SaneBox for ongoing management. Or vice versa-use SaneBox for automatic sorting and Clean Email occasionally for bulk actions.

Which tool works better with Gmail specifically?

Both work well with Gmail. SaneBox creates labels in Gmail that function as folders. Clean Email works with Gmail's native labels and can apply them as part of rules.

Gmail users might slightly prefer SaneBox because it works entirely within Gmail's interface-you never leave Gmail. Clean Email requires switching to a separate app, which some Gmail power users find disruptive.

Can I cancel easily if I don't like it?

Yes, both services make cancellation straightforward. SaneBox lets you cancel anytime and even offers guidance on whether to keep or remove Sane folders from your email after canceling. Clean Email also allows easy cancellation through account settings.

Neither service makes it difficult to leave, which is a good sign of confidence in their product.

Will my emails be deleted if I cancel?

No. SaneBox doesn't store your emails-they remain in your email account. The folders SaneBox created will stay in your email (you can choose to delete them manually after canceling).

Clean Email also doesn't store emails. All actions are performed directly on your email server. If you cancel, your emails remain untouched in your email account.

Does either tool work with Office 365?

Yes, both work with Office 365. SaneBox supports Office 365 through both IMAP and EWS-OWA protocols. Clean Email works with Office 365 through IMAP.

For enterprise Office 365 deployments with special configurations, SaneBox's ActiveSync support might be necessary.

Can I share an account with my team?

Clean Email's multi-account plans can be used for small teams where each person has their own email account. You'd connect multiple team member accounts to one Clean Email subscription.

SaneBox is designed for individual use, not team sharing. Each person would need their own SaneBox account. However, both services offer enterprise and business pricing for larger team deployments.

Which is better for someone not tech-savvy?

SaneBox is more beginner-friendly because it requires minimal configuration. Connect your email and it starts working immediately. The drag-and-drop training is intuitive-you don't need to understand rules or conditions.

Clean Email requires more upfront learning to understand Smart Folders, Auto Clean rules, and the interface. Less tech-savvy users might find it overwhelming initially.

How long does it take to see results?

SaneBox: You'll see immediate filtering, but accuracy improves over 1-2 weeks as the AI learns. Most users report good results within 2-3 days.

Clean Email: Results are immediate. As soon as the initial scan completes, you can start bulk-cleaning thousands of emails right away.

Related Reading

Looking for other ways to optimize your business workflows? Check out our guides on best email marketing software and CRM tools for small business.