Google made chats in Gmail available to all users of the service
Last year, Google announced its intention to add chats to Gmail to make it easier for users to use the email service for work and study. Previously, chats became available to corporate users of the service, and now the company has begun to distribute this function to all Gmail users.
The developers’ goal is to turn Gmail into a “home to work” by integrating all the necessary tools into the service that will allow you to perform different tasks without having to switch between different tabs and applications constantly. The Gmail Android app now has four main sections. The sections “Mail” and “Meeting,” which appeared a few months ago, were supplemented by “Chat” and “Rooms.” With the Chat section, users will be able to exchange messages privately and in small groups, while Rooms are for broader communication, with the option to use public chat to send text messages and files. In the web version of Gmail, the side control panel will be similarly divided into four sections.
According to reports, the new Gmail tools’ functionality is identical to the Google Chat application, so users can get rid of the separate client that was used to send messages. Also, the service’s internal search is now able to search for data not only in e-mail but also in chats. Google also made several minor changes and slightly updated the user interface controls’ look and feel.
New features will be available to all users of the web version of Gmail and the application for the Android platform shortly. For iOS devices, the Chat and Rooms tools will remain unavailable for now, but Google is likely to fix this in the future.
