Gmail Sees First Overhaul In Nearly 5 Years

Google announced first Gmail overhaul in nearly 5 years

I think it’s pretty safe to say that the vast majority of us have some form of a free e-mail account. With the major service providers these days, it will most likely either be Googles Gmail or Microsoft Hotmail. In recent years though, particularly given Microsoft’s Windows integration with accounts, it’s likely that while a lot of you will have the former, most of you will have the latter.

Admittedly, Google accounts are useful. Particularly if you are a regular user of YouTube, but the email service in itself has struggled to keep up in recent years.

As such, in a report via Reuters, while it may have taken some time, Google has announced the first overhaul of the Gmail service for nearly 5 years.

Whats new?

At present, it’s just the redesign which if you log into your account you should be able to notice immediately. In fairness, it is a lot nicer and looks a little more up to date. I’m not saying that their old design looked dated, but we had all become a little comfortable with it.

Google, do, however, plan to add new features in the coming weeks.

• Security Mode – The ability to control what remains in your inbox, particularly anything that may be of a sensitive nature.
• E-mails with an expiration date – Put simply, they delete after a certain date.
• The ability to attempt to recover accidentally sent e-mails.
• More streamlined folder access.
• Smart Reply – Allowing generic responses to e-mails such as ‘back in 20’.
• Google will recommend e-mails to set to spam or to block the sender.
• Snooze or reminder function with e-mails.

In fairness, a lot of these sound like really good ideas to me and ones which I wish Microsoft had come up with years ago. At this point though, you might be considering making a permanent swap back to Gmail and who could blame you.

What do you think about these changes? – Let us know in the comments!