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Stay informed with your Asana Inbox

In This Article

Your Asana Inbox is your central notification center that keeps you informed about all the work that matters to you. Think of it as your personalized newsfeed for project updates, task assignments, comments, and team communications—all in one organized place.

In this article, you'll discover how to leverage your inbox to stay informed and explore practical strategies to minimize inbox clutter.

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What is your Asana Inbox?

Your inbox displays updates on all projects you're a member of and tasks you collaborate on or are assigned. It's designed to help you stay informed without getting overwhelmed by notifications.  Unlike My tasks (which shows work you need to do), your Inbox shows updates you need to know about. This distinction helps you separate actionable work from informational updates.

How to access your Inbox

You can find your Inbox in the upper left corner of your Asana sidebar. Click Inbox to view all your notifications. A red dot will appear next to Inbox in the sidebar when there are unread notifications. New notifications in your inbox will have a blue dot next to them. If there's a new activity in a task within a project, you will see a bubble showing the number of new comments or attachments denoting new unread activity.

Decluttering your inbox

Use your inbox to be more productive and focus on what matters. With filters, sorting, bookmark, and archive functions, your inbox can help you cut through the chaos and find clarity.

Sort your inbox by what matters most to you. You can choose from Newest First or Relevance.

Inbox filtering allows you to hone in on the most actionable updates.

Following and unfollowing specific tasks and conversations will mean that you only receive communications on items that are relevant to you. You can do this by adding or removing yourself as a collaborator on specific tasks. If someone @mentions you again in a task, it will still show up in your inbox, even if you have unfollowed the task.

If you love a clear inbox and aim for inbox zero, our Archive function is for you. As all your work is organized and searchable in Asana, you don’t need to save notifications. Once you’ve taken action on a notification, you can select to archive it. You’ll find your archived notifications in the archive tab.

Bookmarks can be used for important tasks that you would like quick access to and notifications you would like to save to check in or reference later.

You can also select Manage notifications. Here, you can turn on “Do not disturb,” schedule times you do and don’t want to receive notifications and select the type of notification.

Filtering your inbox

Inbox actions

Managing your inbox notifications

For every notification in your inbox, you should take one of three actions:

1. Archive

If you just need to read the notification, archive it by hovering over the notification and clicking the archive icon. Archived notifications move to your Archive tab where you can access them later if needed.

2. Respond (and archive)

When someone asks a question or needs your input:

  1. Click into the notification to see full details
  2. Respond directly from your inbox without visiting the project
  3. Archive the notification after responding

Sometimes a simple "like" reaction is all the response needed.

3. Capture (and archive)

If a notification prompts new work that you can't complete immediately:

  1. Create a follow-up task by clicking the task icon
  2. The new task will appear in your My tasks
  3. Archive the original notification

This keeps your My tasks as your single source of truth for actionable work.

Best practices for Inbox management

Check your Inbox regularly

Plan to check your Inbox 1-2 times per day, similar to how you check email. This keeps you informed without constant interruptions.

Process notifications efficiently

Don't let notifications pile up. Use the three-action approach (Archive, Respond, Capture) to keep your Inbox organized and ensure nothing falls through the cracks.

Unfollow unnecessary notifications

If you're receiving notifications for work that's no longer relevant to you, click into the task or project and select Unfollow to stop receiving updates.

Use the Archive tab

Your archived notifications remain accessible in the Archive tab. This is helpful when you need to reference past conversations or updates.

Inbox vs. My tasks

Unlike your My tasks, your inbox is not your to-do list. If you see a task in your inbox that you need to take action on, such as scheduling a meeting to discuss a particular topic, create a follow-up task that will hyperlink back to the original task, or assign yourself a task. Remember, when working in Asana, everything you need to do is in your My tasks, whereas everything you need to know is in your inbox.  

The more work you and your team create, discuss, and achieve in Asana, the more you’ll rely on your notifications to keep track of progress and actionable work. Keeping a clear inbox means you’ll see relevant notifications quickly without going through unnecessary information. Using filters to highlight important topics and archiving notifications you’ve read and don’t need to action leads to less clutter and gives you control. 

Additional resources

 

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Stay Informed with your Asana Inbox