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Free n8n template · Customer Service

n8n Gmail AI triage: automatic labels, draft replies and a daily digest

This n8n workflow reads each new unread email in Gmail, uses an AI text classifier to sort it into urgent, sales, support, invoices or newsletters, and applies the matching Gmail label. For urgent, sales and support email it writes a reply and saves it as a Gmail draft in the same thread, ready for you to check and send. At 5 pm each weekday it emails you a digest of what came in.

Difficulty
Beginner
Setup time
About 30 minutes
Nodes
16
Checked against
n8n 2.41
  • n8n
  • Gmail
  • OpenAI or Anthropic

Last reviewed October 2026

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What this workflow does

A busy shared or personal inbox mixes customer problems, new sales enquiries, supplier invoices and newsletters in one list. Important messages get buried, replies go out late, and an hour every morning disappears into sorting rather than answering. Filters help, but they only match senders and keywords, not what an email is actually asking for.

This template is for owners, operations managers, account managers and small support teams in Australian businesses who live in Gmail or Google Workspace. It sorts mail by meaning, prepares a first draft for the messages that need a reply, and leaves every send decision with a person, because a wrong automatic reply to a customer costs more than the time it saves.

Who it's for

  • →Business owners who handle their own inbox
  • →Small support teams working from a shared Google Workspace mailbox
  • →Account managers who need urgent client email to stand out
  • →Office managers who sort invoices and supplier mail

How it works, step by step

  1. 1

    New email

    The Gmail Trigger checks for new unread messages, skipping chats and mail you sent yourself, and passes the full message including sender, subject and body text.

  2. 2

    Classify email

    The Text Classifier node asks the chat model to place each email in one of five categories you describe in plain English. Anything that fits none goes to an Other output.

  3. 3

    Apply Gmail label

    Each category output runs a Gmail node that adds the matching label (AI-Urgent, AI-Sales, AI-Support, AI-Invoices or AI-Newsletters). Other mail is left untouched in the inbox.

  4. 4

    Write draft reply

    For urgent, sales and support email, an LLM chain writes a reply in your voice. It is told never to invent prices, dates or commitments and to leave square-bracket placeholders instead.

  5. 5

    Save as Gmail draft

    The reply is saved as a Gmail draft inside the original thread, addressed to the sender. Nothing is sent; you open Drafts, edit and press send.

  6. 6

    Daily digest

    A schedule trigger runs at 5 pm Sydney time on weekdays, fetches the day's labelled email, combines it into one list and has the chat model write a short HTML digest grouped by category.

  7. 7

    Email me the digest

    Gmail sends the digest to your own address, with a reminder that draft replies are waiting for review.

What you need

Gmail or Google Workspace account

Connected to n8n with OAuth so it can read, label and draft email.

OpenAI or Anthropic API key

One chat model node powers the classifier, the draft writer and the digest.

n8n

n8n Cloud or self-hosted. The workflow must be active for the Gmail Trigger to poll.

Set it up in n8n

  1. 1

    In Gmail, create five labels: AI-Urgent, AI-Sales, AI-Support, AI-Invoices and AI-Newsletters.

  2. 2

    Import the workflow and connect your Gmail credential to the New email trigger and every Gmail node.

  3. 3

    Open each Label node and choose the matching label from the dropdown, replacing the YOUR_..._LABEL_ID placeholders.

  4. 4

    Add your OpenAI credential to the Chat model node, or swap in the Anthropic Chat Model node and connect it to Classify email, Write draft reply and Write digest.

  5. 5

    Edit the category descriptions in Classify email so they describe your real mail, for example naming your key clients under Urgent.

  6. 6

    Edit the system message in Write draft reply with your name, role, business and preferred tone.

  7. 7

    Set your own address in Email me the digest and adjust the schedule if 5 pm on weekdays does not suit you.

  8. 8

    Run the workflow manually on a few recent emails, check the labels and drafts, then activate it.

Get the workflow

Ways to customise it

  • +Add a Gmail node on the Newsletters output to mark those emails as read or archive them.
  • +Forward invoices to your Xero or MYOB bills inbox, or send the attachments to an AP automation workflow.
  • +Post urgent email to a Slack channel or send a push notification so it is seen outside Gmail.
  • +Give the draft writer a knowledge base tool with your FAQs and policies so support drafts are more complete.
  • +Log each classification to Google Sheets to review accuracy and refine the category descriptions.

For Australian businesses

Email bodies are sent to an AI provider for classification and drafting, often in the United States, which is a cross-border disclosure under APP 8 of the Privacy Act 1988. If your mailbox receives health, financial or legal information, check your provider's data retention terms or use a model hosted in an Australian region, such as through Amazon Bedrock or Azure in Sydney. Because the workflow only creates drafts, a person approves every reply, which keeps you in control of what you send under the Spam Act 2003 and your own complaint-handling obligations. The digest runs on Australia/Sydney time; change the workflow timezone for other states.

Tools in this workflow

  • n8n

    Free plan + paid

    Automation

    A workflow automation platform that combines a visual node editor with code when you need it. It connects hundreds of apps and APIs and includes AI agent nodes that can call language models, tools and memory. Teams can self-host the free Community Edition on their own servers or use n8n's hosted cloud.

    Best for: Australian organisations that need automation data to stay onshore

    n8n review →

  • ChatGPT (OpenAI)

    Free plan + paid

    General Assistant

    OpenAI's general-purpose AI assistant. It handles writing, coding, file and image analysis, data analysis and web research through a chat interface, with an API for building it into your own systems.

    Best for: Small and mid-sized teams wanting one general assistant for everyday writing and analysis

    ChatGPT review →

  • Claude (Anthropic)

    Free plan + paid

    General Assistant

    Anthropic's AI assistant, known for careful reasoning, long-document analysis, writing and coding. It can work through large documents and codebases in a single conversation, paid plans include the Claude Code agentic coding tool, and it is available through an API and major cloud platforms.

    Best for: Legal, policy and consulting teams reviewing long documents

    Claude review →

  • Fyxer AI

    Paid

    Email

    An AI email assistant that connects to Gmail or Outlook, sorts incoming mail into categories, and drafts replies in your writing style for you to review and send. It can also join meetings to take notes and draft follow-up emails.

    Best for: Business owners and executives handling heavy email volumes

    Fyxer AI review →

  • Superhuman

    Paid

    Email

    An AI-powered email client for Gmail and Outlook, now part of the Superhuman suite alongside Grammarly, Superhuman Docs (formerly Coda) and the Go assistant. It uses keyboard shortcuts, split inboxes and AI triage and drafting to help people process email faster.

    Best for: Executives and founders handling a heavy daily email load

    Superhuman review →

Frequently asked questions

Does this n8n Gmail AI workflow ever send replies automatically?

No. Replies are saved as Gmail drafts in the original thread. The only email the workflow sends is the daily digest to your own address. You can change that, but drafts are the safer default for customer email.

How does it decide which label to apply?

The Text Classifier node sends the sender, subject and the first part of the body to the chat model with your category descriptions and asks it to pick one. Clear, specific descriptions give the most consistent results.

Will it process emails already in my inbox?

The Gmail Trigger picks up new unread mail from when the workflow is activated. To triage older mail, run a one-off Gmail Get Many node with a search query and connect it to Classify email.

Can I add or rename categories?

Yes. Add a category in the Text Classifier, create a matching Gmail label and connect a new Label node to the new output. Keep the category count small so the model can tell them apart.

Does it work with Outlook?

The same pattern works with the Microsoft Outlook Trigger and Outlook nodes, which support categories, folders and draft messages. Swap the Gmail nodes and keep the classifier and draft writer.

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