Google is cutting the clutter from the inboxes of Gmail users. The web software giant announced a new design for its popular email service yesterday, which will see incoming mail pre-sorted into relevant categories.

The update will transform the way Gmail appears both on the desktop and in mobile applications, with the most important emails from family, friends and colleagues appearing in the Primary tab.

Other tabs suggested by Google include Social for notifications from Facebook, LinkedIn and the like, Promotions for commercial offers, and Updates for things like bills, receipts and confirmation emails. Messages from online groups, discussion boards and mailing lists will appear in the Forums group.

The inbox organization groups are optional, and a user can choose which of the five categories, if any, they want to use. The update will be rolled out to users in the coming weeks. Users can also manually configure it through the settings tab in Gmail.

The revamped design comes three years after Google’s previous attempt at managing email clutter, when it launched the Priority inbox. Numerous startups such as Sparrow and Mailbox have also launched apps that attempt to tame Gmail.

Gmail is the world’s most popular email service, with some 288 million users as of October 2012, according to web tracking firm Comscore.

Microsoft’s Hotmail, now known as Outlook.com, has 286 million users, while Yahoo had 281 million users.

Related Topics