Material You Gmail widget gets a redesign with archiving and shortcuts

A quite powerful and useful Gmail widget is now rolling out to Android 12 users, reports 9to5Google. Back in September, the widget got the Material You look, but it remained pretty simple in terms of overall features. Now, this is changing with the new update.

Gmail Material You widget becomes more useful now

The current widget that Google updated with Material You's Dynamic Color is a simple list with a compose button for a new email. Now, the new updated Gmail widget, coming with Gmail version 2021.10.31, switches to a more functional design matching Google Keep, with a large header that notes the name of your selected folder.

A rounded square floating action button appears in the top right-hand corner of the widget and shows a list of messages (sender, subject, and time), which are accompanied by an archive button at the right. The new widget no longer displays the first line of an email, saving space.

If you decide to go for the wider widget, you additionally get a bottom bar with shortcuts that open Gmail to the Chat, Spaces, or Meet tabs. Meanwhile, if you shrink the height of the home-screen widget, you get a right sidebar layout with the same three shortcuts.

This new widget is a powerful home-screen widget that lets you actually do some helpful action on it. The way it allows you to delete/archive messages makes it actually a quite useful alternative to deleting emails from your notification shade.

Gmail version 2021.10.31.x is now rolling out via the Play Store.

The Gmail app is getting more and more useful

Recently, we reported on another great feature that the Gmail app for Android is now equipped with, and it is search filters.

Before this update, searching through your inbox in the Gmail app for Android took a lot of time, mainly because of the lack of any filters. In the desktop version, you still had the possibility to filter by the recipient, subject, keywords, email size, and date, which made searching quite easier. The cool thing is that Google has also updated the desktop version of Gmail as well, adding more enhanced ways to search.

On Android, Gmail users will now be able to use filters with the search results to find specific emails and information. The new filters can be used independently or after the search is complete, as they appear as drop-down lists. The update is currently rolling out. Once you get it, you will see buttons for the following filters: "From", "Sent to", "Date", and "Attachments", after entering a search term.

On the iOS front, Google has not abandoned the Gmail app either. Recently, the tech giant gave some update love to its productivity apps on iOS, including Gmail and Google Meet. For iOS, Gmail also got a new Gmail widget with more useful actions you can perform on it. This new Gmail widget's release is based on feedback from the first Gmail widget for iOS users. The new home-screen widget can help you better manage your inbox on iOS, and you will be able to see the senders and the subjects of your most recent emails.

Another feature introduced for iOS users was picture-in-picture support to Google Meet, which makes it possible for you to participate in a meeting on Meet while doing something else in another app on your iOS device.