Starting Next Week, Gmail Users Will Get A New Design View

JAKARTA - Google recently rolled out a number of updates to its services, including Gmail which will get a new design. First showcased last year, this design is what Google calls an integrated display interface.

This is because the goal is to integrate Google's newest messaging service. Those services include Google Chat (the successor to Hangouts) and Google Meet into Gmail. The main body will remain largely the same, but there have been a lot of changes to the Gmail navigation sidebar.

Currently, the Gmail sidebar houses the sections that users expect, such as Inbox, Drafts, Trash, and a list of labels. This redesign will add a new, higher-level navigation pane to the left side of the page, allowing users to switch between Gmail, Google Chat, Spaces (Google Chat group chats), and Google Meet.

In addition to the four app navigation options, the new sidebar also has a stack of icons at the bottom. This looks like a chat profile picture. This new Gmail design will start rolling out on February 8th. If users don't like this new design, they can revert to the classic Gmail design in settings.

Launching Ars Technica, Wednesday, February 2, in April, users will also be automatically registered in the new interface. Meanwhile, at the end of Q2 2022, the interface has become the standard for Gmail, with no option to use the classic interface again.

Google says there will also be a new streamlined navigation experience in the web version of the Chat service. That means, users will get a similar sidebar setup where they can jump into Gmail directly from Google Chat.

In addition to the new sidebar, the Gmail redesign also changes Gmail's colors and layout. The main mail pane now resides in a white box with rounded corners, while the navigation elements of most screens are currently not accentuated in light gray.

The accent color for the compose button and the selected section used to be red, but is now blue. Red is Gmail's icon color, but with the new rainbow icon and the removal of the red highlight, things seem to have changed.

Then, there was Google Talk which was integrated into Gmail not long after its launch in 2005. When Google switched from Google Talk to Hangouts in 2013, Google Talk in Gmail was replaced by Hangouts.

The real purpose of this update is to pursue the success of Slack and Microsoft Teams with business users. Gmail and other Google Workspace apps are very popular with companies, but Google doesn't have a dominant messaging solution. Sales promotions for business users as well as those who have spent this long on Gmail.

With this new design, Google Chat is gaining a more prominent place in one of Google's most popular apps, but it doesn't look like Google is doing anything to address the major functional deficiencies of Google Chat.