# Marking messages as read

Zulip automatically keeps track of which messages you have and haven't
read. Unread messages have a dark line along their left side, which fade as
the message gets marked as read.

There are two situations in which messages automatically get marked as read.

* **End of feed**: When you get to the bottom of a view, Zulip marks all
  messages in that view as read.

* **Blue box**: Messages are marked as read when the blue box passes over
  them.

You can move the blue box either with the keyboard (arrow keys, `End`, etc.)
or by scrolling the feed with your mouse.

You can also manually **mark all messages as read**, or **mark all messages in a
stream or topic as read**.

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1. Hover over a stream, topic, or All messages in the left sidebar.

1. Click the down chevron (<i class="fa fa-chevron-down"></i>) to the right.

1. Click **Mark all messages as read**.

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