How do I search Gmail by date?

Q I wanted to search my Gmail messages to find emails from a particular contact between two specific dates. It was easy enough to narrow down the messages by contact, but then the only way I could find to locate the relevant messages was to laboriously click the Older arrow to reach the relevant date period. I’m sure there must be an easier way than this but I can’t find it in Gmail’s options. Can you help? Carole Ashbourne

A There are a couple of ways to do this. First, the quick way. Once you’ve typed your contact’s name into the search box, click the down arrow at the right-hand side of that same box and choose ‘Create filter’. At the bottom, where it says ‘Date within’, select a period (‘1 week’, say), then type a date in the box to the right. Now click the magnifying-glass icon.

The only problem with that method is that you need to mentally figure out the ‘middle’ date — and that’s not ideal for longer ranges. So, the longer method is to type the specific date range right after your contact’s name, using the special parameters ‘after:’ and ‘before:’, with the date written in reverse order. For example, typing johnsmith@hisemailaddress.com after:2016/01/01 before:2016/12/31 would show any messages from that contact received in 2016 (see screenshot below).

Note that there are many other search perameters that can be used in a similar way. Google publishes a full list at www.snipca.com/25993.