How it works
How Kerna works: the AI email assistant inside Gmail and Outlook
Kerna handles the work that arrives as email: client enquiries, what you agreed with a supplier, invoices, the next reply on a thread that is already forty long. It sorts the inbox into your own categories, summarises the conversation, pulls the fields out of an attachment and drafts the reply — inside the Gmail or Outlook you already use.
45 languages·Ready-made sets for 20 industries·You read and send every message
Start with whatever is taking the longest today
A full inbox, a thread you have lost track of, an invoice whose figures belong in a spreadsheet. Open Kerna in the sidebar and choose the one you need. Each works on its own, and they combine when a single piece of work needs more than one.
Sorting the inbox
Email triage: see which messages need something from you
Quote requests, supplier updates and documents for the accountant all arrive in the same inbox. Kerna groups them by what they are, using categories that match the work you actually do, so you can choose what to take first and deal with similar things together.
Start from one of twenty industry sets, or describe your own categories — "to quote", "waiting on supplier", "for accounts". Adapt a ready-made set rather than building one from nothing.
For example: In sales, new enquiries sit apart from live negotiations. In purchasing, everything about a changed delivery date ends up in one group.
Run triage
One action. Kerna reads what is in the inbox and sorts it into the categories you chose — one of twenty industry sets, or categories you wrote yourself. The inbox comes back grouped, so what needs you today is separated from what does not.
Triage is a feature in its own right, not a preamble to answering something. Plenty of people run it and stop there: a sorted inbox and a clear order of work is a result, even on a day you write no replies at all.
In Gmail In Outlook
Thread summaries
Thread summaries: pick a conversation back up without reading all of it
The client has added another reply and you need to know where things stand. Kerna summarises the thread: what was decided, what is still open, and who is waiting on whom.
For example: Coming back to a negotiation after a week away, or taking over correspondence a colleague has handed to you.
Summarise the thread
Forty replies deep and just added to. Kerna gives you the decision, the open question and who is waiting on whom.
In Gmail In Outlook
Translation
Email translation: work with clients and suppliers in 45 languages
A message arrives in German, French or Italian. Read it in your own language, write the reply in your own language, and send it in theirs. The whole exchange happens in the same mailbox, from reading the enquiry to having the reply ready to send.
For example: A supplier sends changed delivery terms in German. You read the translation, write your answer in your own language, and translate it into German before sending.
Translate what arrived
A supplier writes in a language you do not read. Kerna works across 45 languages, in both directions, tuned per language rather than passed through a generic translator.
In Gmail In Outlook Translate the reply back
You read the original in your own language. The reply goes the other way, into the language your correspondent actually uses — they get it in theirs, and you work in yours throughout.
In Gmail In Outlook
Data from attachments
Data from emails and attachments: into a spreadsheet without retyping
The order number, the delivery date, the invoice total, the recipient address. Kerna pulls the fields you name straight out of the message, and out of PDF, DOC and XLS attachments on it.
For an attachment, choose one of a hundred ready-made sets of fields across twenty industries, and add your own — an internal order number, say. Check what was read and export it to a document or a spreadsheet.
For example: A PDF invoice arrives. You pick the fields your ledger needs, check what Kerna read off the document, and export them to a sheet.
Pull the fields out of the message
The order number, the date, the amount, the address, all sitting in the body of the email rather than attached to it. Kerna reads them out as named fields instead of leaving you to scroll and copy.
In Gmail In Outlook Open the message
The one with the PDF, DOC or XLS on it. Kerna is already in the sidebar, so there is no separate upload step and no second tool to open.
In Gmail In Outlook Pick the set of fields
A hundred ready-made sets, twenty industries by five document types. The fields are named before you start, which is the difference between a tool you use today and one you meant to configure.
In Gmail In Outlook Add your own fields
Start from a ready-made set and adapt it. Add the internal reference your finance team keys on, and Kerna looks for that too, alongside the ones that came with the set.
In Gmail In Outlook Check it and export
A Google Sheet or Doc from Gmail, an Excel, Word or CSV file from Outlook. A new file every time, so nothing you already have is appended to or overwritten.
In Gmail In Outlook
In Gmail
One attachment at a time, exported to a Google Sheet or a Google Doc. A new file every time, so nothing you already have is appended to or overwritten.
In Outlook
Every attachment on the message in one pass, or just one if that is all you need, exported to an Excel or a Word file. A new file every time.
AI replies
AI replies: say what the message has to do, get a draft
Confirming what was agreed, asking for more time, turning down the terms on the table. Choose what the reply is for, set the tone, and add the details that have to appear in it.
Kerna writes the draft from the thread and from what you chose. Eight things a reply can be for and seven tones, so the message fits both the situation and your relationship with the person reading it. The draft lands in the ordinary reply window in Gmail or Outlook: you read it, change what you want, and press Send.
For example: A client asks for an earlier delivery. You give the date you can manage, choose the tone, and generate a reply carrying your proposal.
Generate the reply
Decide first, edit later. Seven tones and eight things a reply can be for: decline firmly, agree with a condition, ask for more time, chase an invoice. Choosing up front is what stops you rewriting a generic draft into the register you needed all along. Kerna writes it from the thread and from what you just chose, so the draft already knows what was asked and what has been agreed.
In Gmail In Outlook You press send
Kerna never sends anything. The draft waits in your reply window until you have read it and sent it yourself — which is what matters anywhere the work gets audited.
In Gmail In Outlook
New messages
Writing new email: from a rough idea to a message with a subject line
An enquiry to a new supplier, a proposed meeting, a payment reminder. Kerna helps when you are the one starting the conversation and there is nothing to reply to.
Pick the recipients, then start from one of 200 ready-made topics across twenty industries, an instruction you saved, or a description of the message you write once. Fill in the specifics, set the tone, and Kerna writes the subject line and the body.
Choose who it goes to
Type the addresses, pull them from your contacts in Gmail or Outlook, or import them from Excel if you are in Outlook.
In Gmail In Outlook Choose where the message comes from
Three routes, and they do different jobs. An instruction you saved earlier and use again. One of 200 topics, ten for each of twenty industries. Or a description you write for this message alone and do not keep.
In Gmail In Outlook Give it the specifics
The names, the dates, the amounts. A short form asks for what the message cannot be written without, rather than leaving you to remember what you forgot to mention.
In Gmail In Outlook Set the tone
The same control you get on a reply. How the message should land is a decision, not something to be discovered by rewriting it four times.
In Gmail In Outlook Generate it in the language you think in
A complete draft with the subject line already written. Write it in the language you can actually judge, because you cannot check a draft you cannot read.
In Gmail In Outlook Then translate it into theirs
A second pass, into any of the 45 languages. You checked the message while it was still in your own language, and the recipient gets it in the one they use.
In Gmail In Outlook It lands in your compose window
And stops there, exactly as a reply does. Nothing goes anywhere until you press send.
In Gmail In Outlook
Getting started
How to start using Kerna
Add Kerna to your mail from Google Workspace Marketplace or Microsoft AppSource, then open its panel in the Gmail or Outlook you already use.
Begin with one job rather than all of them: summarise a long thread, draft a reply that is waiting, or pull the figures off an attachment. Run triage across the whole inbox once you have decided what your categories should be.
Install
Kerna appears in the sidebar of the Gmail or Outlook you already use. Your mailbox does not move and nothing is imported.
In Gmail In Outlook
Questions people ask before installing
The six that come up most often, answered before you have to ask.
Do I have to change my email program?
No. Kerna runs as an add-in inside Gmail and Outlook, in the sidebar of the mailbox you already use. Nothing is migrated and nothing is imported.
Do I have to configure everything before I can use it?
No. Start from the ready-made industry categories, the ready-made sets of extraction fields and the ready-made message topics, and add your own later, when you find something they do not cover.
Do I have to use all of the features?
No. Pick the one that fits the job. Sort the inbox, summarise a single conversation, or export the data off one attachment. A more involved piece of work will use several of them together.
Does Kerna send email on its own?
No. Kerna prepares drafts. You read every message and send it yourself from Gmail or Outlook. Kerna does not send mail itself; on Gmail, Google labels the permission that lets an add-on write a draft “Manage drafts and send emails”, and Kerna uses it only for the draft.
Can I write in my own language to people abroad?
Yes. Write the message in your language, check it while you can still read it, and translate it into the recipient’s. Kerna covers 45 languages in both directions.
Where does our email actually go when we use an AI tool?
Cloud Run in Belgium, Firestore in Poland, and model processing contracted with OpenAI Ireland Limited under a signed zero data retention agreement, so message content is not retained after your result comes back. Personal data is removed before content reaches the model.
Take the next email with Kerna
Free to start. No migration, no card, and personal data is redacted before anything reaches the model.