Tip 982: Filtering for 'where I am the only person on the To line'

The filter rule for "where I am the only person on the TO line" only applies to the display name for the email account, not the email address.

I want to create a conditional formatting view for my Inbox to highlight all messages sent only to me. I selected the box "where I am the only person on the To line" but it only applies the conditional formatting if the name is exact. If the sender uses only my e-mail address (so the To line shows alias@domain.com) or my name enclosed in quotes or some other variation, it won't apply the formatting. How do I get conditional formatting to look at the e-mail address being used rather than the display name?

You need to create the filter conditions using the Sent to field or use the Advanced tab. Both of the To fields use the display name (as does the From field on the Advanced tab).

You will need to either type all variations of your display name in the Sent to field (use quotes around each name) or use the Advanced tab and create one rule for each name variation (no quotes needed). Use To is (exactly) alias@domain then create a second rule for To is (exactly) your display name. Repeat for each variation of your name. That To field only checks the display name, but when you use multiple lines for the same field, they are OR'd together.