So your Gmail sidebar menu collapsed and you need to unhide it? You're not alone.
Change is hard. But Google seems to disagree...
I love that Google is always working on new features and functions for Gmail, but every now and then a new feature or design comes along that makes me scratch my head.
The latest Gmail update includes:
- helpful reminders (e.g., "Received 3 days ago. Reply?")
- a new, sleek design
- a snooze feature (you can pick a future date for mail to re-appear in your inbox)
- a collapsing sidebar
I have to say, as a work-from-home professional that uses their personal email for business, I love the snooze feature.
But... a collapsing menu? Why?
Well. I guess I understand why.
People want to maximize their screen space.
Nothing could go wrong with that one. That is unless users aren't clear on how to hide and unhide the sidebar.
That would be no fun at all. Hmm.
So your Gmail sidebar menu has collapsed, and you can't figure out how to keep the sidebar from collapsing? If your left navigation panel is collapsed and only appears if you hover over it, I have the fix.
Here's how to reveal your main menu for good:
- Head to your Gmail.
- Click the Main Menu button.
It's in the upper left corner of the screen above the Compose button. These three horizontal lines are commonly referred to as a "hamburger" menu.
When you hover, it says "Main menu." See the photo below.
This three-line button will hide or unhide the main menu.
Hello, my friend.
When you hide the menu, Gmail will always collapse the main menu by default and show icons only. You can hover over the smaller icons to reveal the full menu with text temporarily.
When you unhide the menu, it will always display the sidebar by default. This is my preferred setting.
I much prefer to have my menu uncollapsed.
As much as I understand the desire to maximize screen space, my brain really can't compute those icons. There are too many menu items (inbox, starred, snoozed, important, sent, drafts, spam, trash) for icons to be feasible for me.
Plus, I actively use my folders/labels, so I like to see the navigation in its full glory.
It's so simple to show/hide the menu, yet it stumped me! The menu button is hidden in plain sight.
Why didn't I think of that?
If you're a user of the Gmail app, you may be more familiar with the hamburger menu. In the app, you don't see the menu at all unless you tap the menu icon on the left side of the search bar.
I think most of us are accustomed to seeing hamburger menus on mobile, so maybe it's the desktop context that's throwing us all off. (You see, I'm assuming you're here because you are/were just as stumped as I was).
And when I went looking for an answer, it seemed I was in good company, so don't beat yourself up. It's so easy to accidentally click the button, perhaps aiming for the frequently-used Compose button.
UX changes are likely the things that keep Google Developers up at night.
Will people know how to collapse the menu?
Will people know how to unhide the menu?
The answer is maybe... but if not, there will be a tutorial for that.
But hey, there's good news.
If you don't like the Gmail sidebar, you can hide it... as you must have discovered if you found yourself here reading this article.
Sorry, my glass half full POV kicked in.
Next, check out my tips for organizing your Gmail inbox. I've used Gmail since it was in Beta testing (I believe it was around 2004 or so), so I know a thing or two about the platform.
I share my tips for using labels, automating your inbox with filters, change the default sorting of your incoming email, archive email, and using my favorite add-on.
What's my favorite add-on, you ask?
Well, you'll just have to read my tips and see for yourself. But, I will tell you: it bundles all of your subscription emails into one easy-to-read daily digest.
What are you waiting for?
Maren says
Thank you so much for this very clear and amusing response to my question! I am 74 years old and can't tell you what a relief it is to find help like this!
Kelsey Smith says
You are very welcome Maren, I am happy to help.
Alison says
Thank you so much for posting this. I hate the collapsing menu, and hoped it wasn't permanent. So incredibly helpful - thank you again.
josh says
thank you this is so unintuitive
Patricia says
Thank you for this tip 🙂
Matty Dare says
Thanks for the 'fix' - it baffled me that much I had to Google it and this post came up.
Lisa says
Thank you!!!!!!!!
That's all.
CBarry says
Well, that was easy! Thanks so much, you made my day 🙂
Veronika says
Oh, thank you! I clicked on the Menu by mistake and the panel collapsed. I am so grateful for your advice, I could not stand if it would collaps again and again! The motions on site make me restless and irritable. Also, I don't understand the poetics of icons, it's not memorable, regardless of the graphics. Old systems and software were the best. Does someone remember the colour marking in old Mac systems? On the whole line? Organized, well visible even from the distance, without the necessity of trying to assign the correct colour label to the particular name of the item… It seems not probably every, but many changes to the new are to worse…
Ivan Kinsman says
Good advice. It's a bug in Google in my opinion.
Sami says
4 years later and this is still providing relief of stress and some well needed comfort and calm. Thank you!!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to bring peace to the world!
David says
Thanks
Peter says
Thanks for taking time to post useful tips
Zoe says
Thank you! I feel so much better now 🙂
neilB says
SO helpful, that’s been frustrating me, I thought I must have inadvertently clicked something. Or used a keystroke that had collapsed it.
Meike says
hahahahaha so simple yet I was not able to figure it out myself. Thanks for this post! The collapsing sidebar was driving me insane 😀
Roma says
Thanks so much! That collapsing menu was annoying until I finally decided to do a search and your site came up with the simple solution! Simple once you know it! Thanks again!
me says
THANK YOU
Lorraine Bell says
Thank you so much!!! This has been driving me crazy for the last few weeks 🙂
Dorji says
Thank you. It was adding to my covid stress.
Hope some people in Google would do something better to justify their salary
HA HA HA
Rob says
Thank you!!! The collapsing label panel was so irratating! Thank you for saving my sanity!
Heidi F says
THANK YOU! I goofed somehow and did the fatal disappearing-click-trick. The way the skinny menu kept animating to slide out when I hovered over it was maddeningly distracting. Productivity happiness and stable chonky menu now restored!
Isabelle says
oooh that tip made my day! I was getting mad that I had activated that option my accident. Thanks a million!
Kelsey Smith says
I'm here for you!
Forester says
Wonderful! Thanks that solved my issue.
Happy new 2022
Abbie says
Dear kelsey, you say: When you unhide the menu, it will always display the sidebar by default. I clicked on the hamburger and am on Main menu. So I have it unhid but the whole side bar is covered up by Meet window. I can only see Inbox, Starred, Snoozed and then the rest of the side bar is covered by this Meet window in front of it. When I try the scroll thing to go down, it goes too fast. So I can't see Drafts or Sent and I need to get into these. What do I need to do? Thank you. Abbie
Kelsey Smith says
There is a horizontal line right above the Meet section, you can click and drag that down to reveal more of your folders.
John Alden says
Ah if only that were true (vertical line). Yes, I have the 3 bar (menu) at the top left, and yes when I click it it narrows and widens the list however the list only contains system mailbox folders, none of my mail folders. There is NO vertical bar at the right of the list because the list is so short. Clicking 'More' just shows a few more system lists such as starred, important, chats etc etc. I cannot see my created folders. Reloading Gmail returns the list to normal but it's not long before the list is abbreviated once more. I cannot figure out what I do that causes my folders to be removed from the list. Any ideas would be appreciated. John.
Kelsey Smith says
That is strange. Try going to Settings then click on Labels and see if any of your Labels are set to Hide. You might also try accessing your inbox in another browser to determine if it's a browser-specific issue (possibly caused by a plug-in).
Lawrence says
Awesome Kelsey, thanks so much for this well explained and quick fix to a silly Google option that nobody ever wanted! But I digress.
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help Lawrence!
Some French Guy says
Merci !
Kelsey Smith says
De rien
Matt Breslow says
This just became my favorite blog post of all-time! Thanks for posting and saving me much aggravation.
Kelsey Smith says
I am honored.
Kanchana Kodituwakku says
Thank you SO MUCH! The collapsing bar was irritating me beyond belief and I've been putting weird search strings into Google trying to figure out a workaround. Couldn't believe it was so easy. Thank you again!
Dawn says
Big help! I never thought that it was that easy. It's been annoying me for days. I must have clicked the hamburger button accidentally.
TINA says
NOW I CANT LIVE WITHOUT YOU!!!
Kelsey Smith says
😆 happy to help!
solid aim says
Thanks Kelsey, it helped.
Julie says
Thank you! I could not figure this out for the life of me. Such an easy fix too!
walt.barbier says
You just saved another person from the insane asylum! Thank you!
Pete says
Thank you! This was driving me crazy.
Yvette van Antwerpen says
Thanks Kelsey. Very useful.
Annette says
Thank you so much, it was driving me crazy!
Nicolas says
Thank you so much. It was so annoying
Celine Rose says
Thank you AGAIN! I fixed my sidebar by way of your instructions here I am, today...a few months later and my sidebar collapsed again! I found your advise and I'm good to go! You saved me so much frustration for a second time. I love smart people who dumb stuff down for those of us who are technically challenged!
Kelsey Smith says
Hey Celine, I'm happy I could help out (twice!)
Bia says
Oh my god, thank you SO much. It had been stressing me out for the past weeks. Lots of love to u, have a nice week
Kelsey Smith says
You have a great week, too!
Steve says
Thank you!! so simple - so frustrating lol
KBorland says
OMG Thank you! I just noticed this happening on my personal computer (which is newer) and was driving me nuts. Today on my work computer it did it as well. ENOUGH. Thank you for the tip!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help!
GK says
Thank you so much!!!! That collapsing side bar was driving me insane!
Nat says
Thanks so much! I hadn't even notice that Main Menu icon.
Mag says
Very nice! – you actually answered the question in the title of your post. But why write a whole article about it when one short sentence would have sufficed?
Kelsey Smith says
Hi Mag. Considering the other comments left on this article, I think many readers have found value beyond the headline. Thanks for stopping by.
Shivani Bhatt says
Hi Kelsey,
Thank you for this. I was going crazy trying to keep my sanity.
You are my hero for this month!
Shivani
Kelsey Smith says
You're very welcome. I am happy to help.
mike kauffman says
Also... Hamburger Menu? These are generally actual menus with multiple options. I'm not sure which is dumber, the "feature" of disappearing menus, or the fact that they used an inappropriate and unintuitive method to fix their shoddy work.
mike kauffman says
Thank you! It is sad that I had to google this. Sad for me and even sadder for the dev team that made such a stupid feature. It really sucks even if they insisted that some people want this, they failed to make the method for disabling it apparent. They are usually better at making things intuitive. F- on this, gmail team!
Anni says
THANK YOU so much. It was driving me insane. I knew I accidentally clicked on something one day and the darn thing collapsed, but I couldn't figure out what it was. A Google search and bam! There you were. Thank you, thank you. Sanity restored!
sirisha says
Thank you very much for fixing the gmail sidebar issue.
romina says
thank you SO MUCH!!!!
Kelsey Smith says
You are so very welcome.
Linda Nichols says
OK, what am I doing wrong? This hint used to work but today it isn't. I've been trying for a couple hours. I have a choice of nothing on my side bar or only 3 icons show up. I want the list of choices in actual words. How do I get them back?
Kelsey Smith says
This should still work to reveal the icon names. I'm not sure of any other setting that would hide/reveal the sidebar icon names.
Linda Nichols says
Since the Gmail upgrade 2 weeks ago, now I either get 4 icons or the words MAIL or MEETING over on the side and when I'm in an email there are a bunch of icons that show up along the top of the page
I need to be able to get into my SPAM folder. I volunteer with a group that assists disabled vets and sometimes they end up in SPAM for some reason.
I now can't pull up SPAM, TRASH or DRAFTS. Very frustrating.
Thanks for replying. I'll just keep poking things.
Kelsey Smith says
Okay I have two ideas:
Here is something you can check: Go to Settings > Labels > and under System Labels you should see Spam, make sure that you have "show" selected.
Another thing could be that the "Meet" block is just covering your labels. There is a thin horizontal line above the Meet section, you should be able to drag this line down and expose any hidden folders/labels.
Jack says
OMG thanks! I was going crazy trying to find how to keep the sidebar from collapsing! I'm glad I searched using the right keywords it took me to your article.
Brooke says
Kelsey! Thank you so much!!!
Another grateful person that you have helped. 🙂
Edward Bear says
Thanks. There is nothing worse than sidebars flashing open and closed literally a hundred times a day. I have three screens to I don't need this space-saving "feature".
Google has great ideas but should ALWAYS offer a way to opt out, which is explained at the time of introduction.
Becca says
OMG, thank you so much for posting this because I could not deal with not being able to see my left side panel, and I searched the settings via the icon that looks like a "gear" at the top right of gmail. I read some other explanation on the web of how to solve this issue, but I could not, for the life of me, figure out where my "hamburger menu" icon was. I could not find any icon that looked like a hamburger. So, thanks a million for explaining what a hamburger menu looks like!!
Sadiya says
Thank you so much!!!!
Much love from India!
Melinda says
Thank you so much!
nicole says
OMG That was it!? It was that simple yet complicated! Haha! Thanks for this post! Without it I was completely lost!
Yuan says
google are nuts if they think thats intuitive.... everyone else has a effing pin symbol. The hamburger is a drop down menu symbol.
Laura says
Thank you so much for stating how to expand and collapses the mail "inbox." I looked for this for hours. Thank you so much!
Joy says
Thank you so much! I was going crazy with this collapsing menu.
Nellybelly says
Thank you, you saved my life! This had me on the brink of insanity : (
BJ says
THIS WORKS!!!
Thanks for taking the time to post this. That #&*@! collapsible menu was driving me to distraction. NOTE TO GOOGLE DEVELOPERS: "Different" is NOT always "better."
Jenna says
The collapsing Menu on the left side of Gmail. was driving me nuts, I got dizzy spells and nausea while working.
Thank you so much for your advice, you saved me from going mad.
Great Job!!!
Jenna
Amy M says
Hi, I know this was posted ages ago, but I told myself I'd ask anyway. I have a massive amount of labels, but I also use hangouts quite regularly. Sometimes, I can't access the hangouts, because I think the labels list takes over. Usually I can drag the labels section up to get access, but I'm not sure how I do it even. Could you help me?
Kelsey Smith says
There's a grey line just above the Meet/Hangouts section of the sidebar. When you hover your cursor over it, another horizontal grey line appears. Grab and drag that to pull the meet/hangouts section up.
Nellybelly says
I have the opposite problem; I HATE the Hangouts tab, which takes up my precious label space, but I can't pull it down any further and it just lives there in the way....FOREVER!
Kelsey Smith says
You can toggle it to disappear. Below the hangouts box are three icons, a person, a chat bubble, and a phone. Click the chat bubble and Hangouts will disappear.
Petra Wilson says
thanks for this great tip - small thing, but great benefit! Just in case you have ever given it any thought ..... I am looking for tips on sharing gmail with a co-worker. I run my own business and have just engaged a personal assistant, I want to be able to delegate some emails to her with capacity to answer etc. Is there a way of doing that? Can one delegate just the 'primary' tab in gmail?
Thanks again!
Kelsey Smith says
Here are instructions on how to add a delegate, but it's email-wide access, not limited by subfolder.
Pratap Kodancha says
Hello Kelsey Smith,
Thanks a lot for fixing this very irritating feature!
I feel it is stupid irritating bug, not a institutive feature at all!
Thanks again!
Best, Pratap
M D says
Good god,this was easily one of the most helpful and impactful articles I ever read!! The auto-hide behavior was driving me nuts and the solution was indeed really not self explanatory. Kudos !!
Karen Miller says
Thank you! I've been trying to figure this out all day.
AT says
Thank you.
Melissa says
Oh thank you THANK YOU!! I was going CRAZZZZZY with the collapsed side and found nothing worked! Wow, it was there all along, hidden in plain sight, pretty sneaky of Google/Gmail! Thank you again for a fix that was easy to understand and apply, within a couple of minutes!!!
Avi says
Thank you. Amazing how they could make such a UI mistake!
Serious says
Must have just had an update or something and I just dealt with this for the last couple days. In my web design days we used to call this Mystery Meat Navigation. It's terrible UX design.
Kelsey Smith says
Mystery meat! I love that, thank you for sharing.
Karen says
Oh my gosh thank you!
AlanaP says
Thank you. The little sucker kept on disappearing and could not get it to stop. It is now as it should be.
Kevin O'Donnell says
This had me absolutely FLUMMOXED!! I HATE that the sidebar kept disappearing on me. I use about 4 different Gmail accounts and this was only happening on 1 so this was worse still!
Thanks so much for fixing it. You have removed a stone from my shoe!
Kevin
Alex says
Oh wow what a terrible UI experience, somehow mine just became collapsed and I'm so thankful to have it back!
James says
Thank you - great help I disliked the new auto hide feature, this is a simple solution! Have clicked on your ads too 🙂
Barbara says
Thanks so much - like the many commenters above, you saved the day for me! And I learned a new term I can impress my digital native kids with - "Hamburger" - how cool is that!
T Morris says
OMG! This article is about 2 years old, but I am SOOOO glad I found it...even today, it proved to be very helpful! Thank you so much!!!!!
lurch says
hahaa thanks for this! helped me a lot, i was going crazy.
there may be too much explaining for such a simple solution (take it as a suggestion if you like), but it did the job anyway. 🙂
Deb says
I have a Samsung Galaxy S6 Tab Lite and there is nothing on any of the menus on my GMail app that address the lock sidebar issue. And, the menus are not in the places you mentioned. Any ideas? Thanks
Kelsey Smith says
I'm not familiar with that tablet, but you're welcome to send me a screenshot of what your google app looks like ([email protected]) and I can take a stab at trouble shooting with you.
Clint Smitheman says
I can't believe I've been living with a collapsed menu for 2 years and I did not have to. Passed your link onto a friend.
Thank you for the time you took to post a well thought out answer with screen shots and arrows.
Heather says
SUPER helpful, thank you!!
Adrian says
Thank you.
john says
fk so many words and so little useful
Kelsey Smith says
Move along, John.
Damian says
Thanks!!!!
this was driving me crazy.
jon says
Looks like it was auto-changed on my accounts over the last couple of days to no longer show the side bar... As both a desktop and a mobile user I _should_ have figured this out.
On the other hand, I was suddenly greeted by 20 some Icons with no text. And quite honestly I use a number of e-mail programs and web based e-mails that I just can't memorize every icon for every different system when I'm switching back and forth all day.
Thank You!!!
And thank you for updating this! (If you hadn't modified it with a date, I probably would have skipped it in my search results for being too old, especially since the change on my desk top just happened!)
Elizabeth Grant says
I'll repeat what most of the comments are...this was driving me bat crazy when I was left literally with less then an INCH to see my menu on the left BECAUSE MY MENU WOULD HIDE AND HANGOUTS/MEETINGS WERE TAKING UP MY REAL ESTATE! I never use those options (now removed them). Lame-o Google.
Thank you so much. This was not you or us. This was very dumb design. Very. I had no unearthly idea when this changed on me and I struggled with this for way too long. The exact opposite of what good tech does. Thanks for permanantly and quickly solving this.
Edward Toh says
Millions thanks to you Kelsey !
This thing was driving crazy for weeks. And finally I found this solution from you.
God bless you !
Antonios J Tsompanidis says
Thank you! This drives me nuts to not be able to see my created folders!
Kip Ingram says
Ah.... Kelsey, I love you. Thank you so much. I owe you dinner - that was making me lose my mind. Stay safe out there!
Mary says
Thank you so much. It is so simple, I would have never thought of it!!! All the best!
Theresa says
Thank you for the humerus, self-deprecating explanation that was making me crazy. Will check out your other tips for organizing Gmail.
Penni says
Thank you!!! It was making me crazy.
Jack says
subject: enlarging the left panel on GMAIL
I am sorry to disturb you with a problem which, for so many others, you already solved.
But in my case, it is not solved: PC, Windows10
What I can see, is a small window which let me see only two labels at once :"INBOX" and "IMPORTANT". Then I can move the existing little cursor and one after the other , other labels appear! This makes me unhappy, I would like to see the entire list , but nothing I tried I, solved a problem . (There is there a little straight line, which can me lowered with mouse and, all the labels list could be seen. But only as long as the mouse is there!)
I will be very much in debt to you, if you can help !
Thanks for your time,
Jack Cohen, PhD
TelAviv,Israel
Kelsey Smith says
In your label sidebar, scroll to the bottom and there should be a gear icon that says "Manage Labels." On this page you can force individual labels to show or hide.
Sean Keam says
THANK YOU SO MUCH! Your guide saved my brain from exploding!
Keith Langley says
Thanks for that. This has solved the problem and is one of the most user friendly explanations I've ever seen. My only question is why Google don't make it more obvious how to stop the collapsing sidebar.
Chanea says
Thank you!!
roni says
you helped me! thank you
Claudia says
Thank you so much!
Linda Fitzpatrick says
Thank you, even all this time later, such a helpful post! I was trying to get rid of the "Chat" and "Meet" sidebar sections which had suddenly appeared. (Managedto find a way to get rid of Chat, but in the process, somehow made the sidebar collapse as default. So THANK YOU for the quick and easy fix! <3
Jose Escobar says
Thank you K!
Siobhan Wilsnagh says
Thank you, it totally stumped me too - now I'm happy! 🙂
Helen Shin says
Thank you!!!
RowBare says
Worked like a charm.
Many thx.
Marilyn Johnson says
My Labels in my gmail sidebar disappeared. I finally got them back by clicking on the bottom of where they used to be and clicked on the middle icon for Hangouts conversations. Tall of my labels immediately reappeared!
MB says
OMG, thank you baby jesus!
Natasha says
Oh thank goodness! Finally found the answer to the most frustrating collapsing sidebar... I searched every setting option and could find nothing. Thank you for this simple but very helpful explanation 🙂
Jan Roberts says
Thank you SO much, Kelsey. This is the only sane answer I have found. Took me quite a long time to get the proper answer. Awesome!!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to be of service.
Olivia S. says
Oh my... it was that easy? god thank you so much for writing this you are a savior
Kelsey Smith says
It got all of us, you're not alone.
Hannibal Starbuck says
Mahalo.
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help!
TOI E HERSHMAN says
Thanks Kelsey - super helpful!
Kelsey Smith says
Glad it worked!
CL Koay says
Thanks for this
Debi says
.......so simple yet so out of my grasp. Doh!!!
thx
Brandy says
OMG! Thank you so much! I dont even know how I collapsed it in the first place. This was so simple, yet was driving me crazy because I couldn't figure out how to undo it. You are the best!
Kelsey Smith says
You are more than welcome! Happy to help.
Manny Negron says
Thanks for keeping me from going crazy... this is soooooooooo unintuitive.
CORD THOMAS says
I echo all the thanks. It was quite frustrating and glad to have my sidebar back.
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help!
Cameo Lovell says
Thank you so much! This was driving me crazy!
Roberto says
It was driving me crazy! - clearly the developers don't know how ppl use the email - specially for work
dennis says
Was going too fast and did it on accident - it was great to find your tip! thanks
Fred Wilbur says
Thanks, Kelsey. I'm a tech guy and sometimes the simplest of functions stump me. After weeks of that collapsing panel frustration, I decided to find the answer. You did well in describing this and I thank you for sharing your knowledge with us.
Arthur Grace says
Thank-you! Remain a star!
CH.NAGESWARA RAO says
Thanks for your help and the solution to the disappearing sidebar in gmail. It was driving me crazy!
Tamara says
Thank you so much! This has been driving me nuts!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help!
Jenna says
Thank you!
Kelsey Smith says
You're welcome!
Joann says
Thanks for the solution to the disappearing sidebar in gmail. It was driving me crazy!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help, Joann. Thanks for commenting.
lotte says
damn! this WAS SO HELPFUL!!
Michelle Walker says
Doh!
Anne says
Thanks! I believe Google's Ux designers are trying to force their new Ux ideas too much.If you understand their concepts, yes, you may feel comfortable using their Ux. However, I believe the Ux should be 'natural'. In the natural world you don't tap hamburgers to drag a paper from under another paper.
Kelsey Smith says
I think you're right, they're probably trying to lead the way while the rest of us are running to catch up.
Rena says
Thank you so much! I was frustrated for days! I can't imagine what Google was thinking with this feature. The icons are strange and the constant opening/closing of the sidebar on hover was obnoxious. So happy!
Kelsey Smith says
I completely agree, I don't care for collapsing sidebars.
Sarah says
Holy cow, been frustrated with this for months thinking it had to have been just a forced update that couldn't be changed. Otherwise I would have figured out how to roll it back by now, right? And to finally look it up and discover it's the most simple toggle... lol thanks so much, Kelsey!
Kelsey Smith says
I completely agree with you, it was not an intuitive feature. I am happy I could help!
helen says
Over a year later and this is still useful! Thanks Kelsey, and now I know about your site, what you do and your dog Beta!
Keep up the good work!
Kelsey Smith says
You are quite welcome, Helen. Happy to help.
PD says
Thank you! A real god-send. You have done your required service to humanity.
Kelsey Smith says
You are too kind.
David Krein says
Thank you, something that was so simple yet eluded me for too long. I agree with you, not everyone likes every enhancement. Picking and choosing is no longer an option.
Kelsey Smith says
Glad I could help!
NileD says
THANK YOU! It was killing me......
Barbara Michalec says
Thank you so much. I too hit the Main Menu bars by mistake without even noticing I'd done it. Next thing I knew, the sidebar was collapsing and not permanent. Your explanation was the only one I could find that I could understand ... and it worked beautifully. I was looking for a push-pin or something similar. I did see the Main Menu bars, but figured they would take me somewhere where I didn't want to go. Who would have thought that Main Menu = pin/unpin sidebar. Not me. Thanks again.
Kelsey Smith says
Google has caused us all a lot of grief! I hope they consider improving this.
Jennifer says
Thanks for the tip!
Kelsey Smith says
You're welcome, Jennifer!
Deborah G Robertson says
Thanks it was driving me nuts. I like new things but I am old school. I am also following your site. Lots of information tidbits. Have a great day. Thanks again.
Kelsey Smith says
Happy I could help! Thanks for following, I appreciate it.
Lori says
Thank you so much! This is the first answer that worked after I looked a number of online forms. I cannot believe how easy it was to fix....thank you!!!
Kelsey Smith says
You are very welcome. When it happened to me, I knew I couldn't be the only one.
Jerry says
Yes! So easy yet so frustrating! THANK YOU!!
Kelsey Smith says
I'm very happy I could help out.
Jamie Allen says
Lifesaver. I accidentally closed it and had no idea how to unhide it. Thanks.
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help.
Charmaine says
Totally! I didn't know what I clicked on when my sidebar collapsed, and I spent months in agony not knowing how to pull the sidebar back in. Coming to know about this fix from this article made it sound like it had been intuitive but obviously it wasn't. Thanks for this short explanation. 🙂
Will Manuel says
Thanks for the help, needed this. It was frustrating me to no end lol!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help!
Luke says
Thank you!
Kathryn B Stakelin says
I feel so stupid!!
Jake says
Bless you!
I must have accidentally toggled the gmail main menu "hamburger" icon without noticing it at the time. Thanks for showing us how to control this behavior. It seems Google is incapable of leaving well enough alone. Too bad my experiences with Yahoo mail and Microsoft mail have been even more frustrating.
No wonder my adult children and their peers have largely moved to phone text instead of email. Not an option for my own clumsy thumbs, though.
Kelsey Smith says
Every now and then Google introduces a new feature or function that drives me crazy! I definitely understand.
Zohar says
Thanks. Perfect!
Kelsey Smith says
Happy to help.
Sandy says
Thanks for this. I was going crazy trying to figure out how to keep that thing open. Gmail getting less and less intuitive
Kelsey Smith says
I am right there with you. Very glad to help!
sanjay says
Thank you so much Kelsey,Though a small thing i was not able to figure out how to make the sidebar from not collapsing.
Carol says
Thank you so much!
lisa says
DITTO!!! I was going crazy too!!! Thank you!
Jen says
likewise this was also driving me crazy until i came across this on your blog - THANK YOU! (and too bad Google did not make this more intuitive or - at the very least - explain how to do this when they made the change)
Charley Borremans says
You life saver you! I don't understand how this tip is already 3 years old. My menu must have been switched on all the time and inadvertently hidden at some point. Always thought it to be some new feature. Glad I know how to make it permanent again.
Celine says
Oh my god. THANK YOU SO MUCH! I am so happy you helped me with that feature. I was frustrated about 20 minutes of every day of my life ever since Google decided that we wanted a collapsed menu. The collapsed menu should be an 0PTION NOT A GIVEN! It's unfortunate that Google is obviously in control but their interface is frustrating and archaic. I'm just glad I found someone to help me fix it. YOU RULE!.
Kelsey Smith says
I'm so happy I could help, I was right there with you!