Google overhauls Android Gmail app

Gmail gets a new refresh
Gmail gets a new refresh

Google has announced a couple of pretty big changes to its Gmail application for Android – but only for Android 2.2 users and above.

The first is an improvement to the Priority inbox, whereby all Priority messages will be given their own special inbox view, regardless of whether they're read or not.

You can also alter the notification settings for only these messages to vibrate or ring when they arrive – an important tool to separate the wheat from the spamchaff.

Compose yourself

Google has also tweaked the way you can compose messages in its Android application, with the main one being the ability to more easily switch between Reply, Reply All and Forward thanks to a new drop-down menu.

You can also choose which account you want to send the mail from if you've added another account to send webmail from when using Gmail.

Google compose

And finally, inline message responses are now included too, which has been somewhat supported before but was a real effort to implement – now it's easy to just tap away and critique another person's message.

See it in an instant

The final bit of Google-ry we're bringing you is the news that Google Instant is now available for Android and iOS devices.

Google instant

Simply heading to your local Google site will now offer you an option to activate Instant if you're running Android 2.2 and above or iOS 4, with suggestions appearing when you begin to type in and search options automatically forming below.

See all this, and more, over at the overly-chirpy Google Blog.

Gareth Beavis
Formerly Global Editor in Chief

Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grown with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.