New Gmail Features for iPhone and Android

Google today announced that it is now offering a new engine for Web-based Gmail on Android and the iPhone. The new client uses Google Gears for caching which means the experience is quicker and that you can access your inbox offline. Other new features include quicker archiving (you can select multiple messages at once), and you can delete/archive messages from either the homescreen or from within each message. We’ve been using the software for a bit now and are impressed with what we see. On the G1, the interface looks much better than even the native Gmail application, especially since you can quickly switch over to view your Calendar or Google Docs. As you move down within a message–or even a list of messages–a floating bar with “Archive, Delete” and “More,” travel with you so you don’t have to move to the top of the page again just to perform one of these actions. If you click “More” you can choose to mark as unread/read, add a star, or report as spam. The bar isn’t intrusive, but we do wish the buttons were a bit bigger so we could click them easier. Google Calendar also has a few features, including the ability to respond to invitations directly from your handset, and add attendees to any event. Check out the new features for yourself by visiting mail.google.com on your Android or iPhone.