If you feel like you’ve seen a lot of “Gmail redesign roll out” posts in the last few months, it’s not just you: Google has been teasing and testing features for new, integrated-view, quick access to apps like Chat and Meet since the start of the year. Last month, it also introduced a new look for Gmail based on the Material You design philosophy. Now, all of this is finally rolling out in one update to all users in the coming weeks.
Let’s make a few things clear. The Material You redesign with new shades for all read emails, the compose button, and all panels are rolling out to everyone. The integrated view — which has the side panel with Mail, Chat, Spaces and Meet icons — is rolling out to everyone who has Chat enabled. If you don’t like it, you can switch back to the old Gmail view through the Quick settings menu.
The new redesign brings filter buttons called search chips like “Has attachment” or “Is unread” to the inbox view. Earlier these filters were available in the search box or when users were browsing through the results of a query, meaning users had to go through that extra step to access these filters.
The company is also rolling out contextual search suggestions improvements. Google is now giving priority to the first name and email addresses over the last name while searching for contacts. Plus, Gmail will consider historical conversations while showing personalized suggestions. For instance, it will show a colleague’s name whom you interact with frequently over another person with the same name.
Google said that it’s also working on optimizing the emoji experience and Gmail for tablets with an aim to ship these features later this year. Earlier this week, the firm introduced new tablet-focused features for Drive, Keep, Docs, Slides, and Sheets, including drag-and-drop for images and files across apps and a multiwindow experience for Drive. Hopefully, Google will introduce some of these features to Gmail.
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