Are unread emails starting to pile up and stress you out? Do long email threads make it hard to keep track of what’s important? Are you finding it difficult to respond on time or remember follow-ups?
If you answered yes to these questions, you’re not the only one dealing with this situation. Managing emails has become a common struggle for everyone.
This is where an AI assistant can prove to be a game-changer. It can help create quick responses, summarize long threads, highlight crucial messages, and share reminders about follow-ups.
The result? How about an organized inbox, faster responses, and smooth communication?
In this post, I explain what an AI email assistant is, how it can help you manage emails, and three state-of-the-art tools from which to choose.
Key takeaways
- Key features of an AI email assistant include smart drafting and replying, tone and grammar improvement for clarity, thread summarization, inbox prioritization, follow-up reminders, and searching across inboxes.
- Implementing this tool is ideal if you experience high email volumes, want to avoid missed follow-ups, and aim to improve response times.
- Choosing the right AI email assistant can improve productivity and streamline email workflow.
What is an AI email assistant?
As the name suggests, an AI email assistant is a tool powered by artificial intelligence technology to help you manage, organize, and respond to emails in real time.
An AI email assistant helps you:
- automatically sort emails by priority;
- create and send appropriate responses;
- summarize long message threads;
- share follow-up reminders;
- translate difficult-to-understand messages in real time.
The best part is that most of these AI email assistants typically live inside everyday tools that you might use. For instance, several tools integrate directly into Gmail, Outlook, or Slack through extensions or built-in plugins. Simply put, you don’t need to switch tabs or learn how to operate a new tool.
An AI email assistant integrates silently and works in the background as you read, write, and organize work emails. Furthermore, several tools function as dedicated productivity apps, like Superhuman or Flowrite, offering an advanced, AI-first email experience.
These tools can save a massive amount of time daily. A report by Microsoft reveals that the average professional receives 117 emails per day, and even when a few go unattended, the situation quickly becomes unmanageable, impacting performance and productivity.
What top AI email assistants can do (features top AI email assistants have)
While some basic AI tools only help you draft messages, the most advanced assistants go much further. Here are the key features that leading AI email assistants offer, either built-in or through tight integrations, to help you manage email workflow seamlessly.
1. Draft and reply to emails
AI email assistants can simplify email communication by automatically drafting responses using past user interactions, predefined templates, and hints:
- Smart draft generation
AI email assistants can generate email drafts from just a few words or bullet points. For instance, they can help turn the hint “Follow up with this client on proposal” into:
“Hi, [Client Name]: I hope you’re doing well. I wanted to follow up on the proposal I sent last week and see whether you had any queries or feedback. Looking forward to your thoughts.”
- Context-aware replies
AI email assistants can also suggest context-aware replies to incoming messages, like replying to an email requesting a meeting:
“Thank you for reaching out! I’m available for a meeting on Monday and Tuesday afternoon. Please let me know which day works best for you.”
2. Improve tone, clarity, and grammar
Every email you send represents your brand, and AI email assistants can help you enhance tone, clarity, and grammar while ensuring that your draft looks professional and engaging. This can help build trust and reinforce brand voice indirectly, thereby encouraging clients to take action.
- Clarity and tone adjustment
AI email assistants can rephrase, simplify, or shorten your messages for clarity. The following complex message provides an example:
“I wanted to ask whether you could maybe possibly review the new marketing keywords shared in the sheet sometime soon.”
An AI email assistant can improve its clarity:
“Could you please review the new marketing keywords from the sheet whenever possible?”
However, even after editing, AI-generated emails sound robotic, but integrating tools like HumanizeAI.io humanizer with AI email assistants can help you create messages in a human-like tone. This can improve readability while keeping the human element intact.
- Grammar and sentence structure enhancement
An AI email assistant can enhance sentence structure grammatically to make your email sound natural, whether you want it to be formal, friendly, or professional. For instance, it can turn the below-shared casual text into a formal structure:
Casual message: “Hey, can you share the content marketing report?”
Formal version: “Dear [Client Name]: I hope you’re doing well. Can you please share the latest marketing report? Best regards.”
Furthermore, using platforms like Grammarly with the AI email assistant can improve your message’s grammar and sentence structure, as they offer valuable suggestions to enhance sentence structure without losing natural brand voice, thereby improving overall communication.
3. Summarize email threads
Reading and analyzing long email chains is time-consuming, and the AI assistant can summarize them without you needing to read all the content.
- Quick digest summaries
AI can condense long email chains into short, easy-to-digest overviews, allowing you to understand the context and take action within a few seconds or minutes.
For instance, AI can create a quick summary of a long internal thread on a new product launch like this:
“Product pricing locked, and the launch date is the 5th of January 2026.”
- Catch up after time off
The tool offers quick summaries to help you catch up with a project when you return to work after a holiday or break. The following summary of tasks missed over a week provides an example:
“Client approved the latest marketing campaign concept and wants a few content edits.”
4. Prioritize and organize your inbox
It’s easy to miss something crucial or feel overwhelmed by clutter from a large volume of emails. That’s where an AI email assistant can help you identify and sort through high-priority emails.
- Prioritizing the most important emails
The AI email assistant platform can identify urgent messages based on the email topic, context, sender, or mentioned deadlines automatically. For instance, it can instantly mark a client escalation as “high priority” and move it to the top of your inbox.
- Smart message sorting
AI email assistant tools can create a separate folder and move non-urgent emails to it. This way, your inbox remains clean and organized. For instance, it can auto-sort promotional messages, newsletters, and automated alerts, then move them to a “low priority” folder, allowing you to identify priority emails.
5. Suggest follow-ups and reminders
The tool can help you remain on top of client conversations by reminding you when someone hasn’t replied and recommending the right time to follow up. This way, marketing workflows move without delays.
- Automated follow-up nudges
The AI email assistant can alert you when a client hasn’t responded in a couple of days. For instance, it can share a prompt like this:
“Do you want to follow up with Jamie on the marketing campaign timelines?”
- Draft-ready follow-up emails
The tool can even create a quick follow-up message that you can share as is. For instance, the AI email assistant can create the following message:
“Hi, Jamie, did you get a chance to review the marketing design mockups? Please let me know.”
6. Search and find answers
Digging through old emails can delay business decisions and marketing campaign execution, and the AI email assistant can help you locate the right email, file, or detail, even if you search with only a single keyword.
- Messages with partial details
The tool can retrieve an email even if you only recall vague cues. For instance, you may type the following hint to find a specific email:
“Give me emails with the keyword “marketing sheet” and a PDF attachment from last month.”
- Searching across the entire history for context
The tool can analyze shared inboxes and past threads to give you relevant emails. For instance, you can simply type this hint:
“Find last quarter’s campaign approval emails with the CEO.”
When and why to use one
Using an AI email assistant can make a difference if you’re dealing with the following scenarios.
You receive a high volume of daily emails
Say your inbox keeps filling up faster than you can clear it, and you observe that the most critical conversations have been pushed down out of sight in the queue. Even routine updates and automated alerts start competing for your attention. An AI email assistant ensures that your inbox remains structured.
You struggle with writing fast and clearly
Sometimes you know your reply’s intent, but creating a clear, confident email can take quite some time. You keep thinking of the right words to rephrase lines and adjust tone. An AI email assistant can help turn your thoughts into crisp, actionable messages in a few seconds.
You want to avoid missing replies or tasks buried in threads
Long email chains often shift topics, and crucial points get buried. You realize that tasks are pending when someone follows up again. That’s when keeping track of multiple conversations starts to feel overwhelming, and an AI email assistant can help track replies and tasks for you.
You’re managing email across multiple teams or projects
When multiple teams reach out simultaneously, each thread demands context, attention, and quick decisions. Switching between conversations makes it easy to lose track of who needs what information, and an AI email assistant keeps every project organized and helps manage emails across teams.
Three AI email assistant tools to choose from
Here are the top three AI email assistants to choose from:
1. Shortwave
Best for: teams and professionals who want a faster, cleaner inbox and rely on AI to organize, draft, search, and automate email workflows.
Key features:
- AI-powered sorting;
- custom filters;
- smart drafting;
- integrated scheduling;
- cross-tool integrations;
- advanced searches.
Pricing: A business plan starts at $24 per month.
(Source: Shortwave)
2. Jace
Best for: professionals who want an AI-driven inbox that drafts replies, organizes emails, automates tasks, and acts like a 24/7 chief of staff.
Key features:
- AI email drafts;
- automatic rules;
- business integrations;
- multi-account support;
- conversational AI.
Pricing: Free seven-day trial and custom enterprise options.
(Source: Jace)
3. SaneBox
Best for: professionals who want an AI-powered inbox that removes clutter, filters out noise, blocks unwanted senders, and keeps follow-ups on track.
Key features:
- email deep-clean;
- BlackHole filtering;
- reminders;
- daily digests;
- newsletter sorting;
- enterprise-grade security.
Pricing: Free trial available, and basic plans start at $2.04 per month.
(Source: SaneBox)
Wrapping up
Time is money when it comes to business, and most communications today depend on emails, making it crucial to respond on time so you don’t miss important opportunities.
Implementing AI email assistants can be a smart move, as it saves time and improves productivity. They ease your workload by drafting messages, organizing conversations, and keeping communication flowing so you can work smoothly. So, streamline your daily workflow with an AI-powered email assistant.
0 comments