An in-depth look at key Gmail functionality

Gmail has become the most popular email service in the world, ever since it was introduced back in 2004. Granted, it doesn’t have an excellent track record when it comes to privacy, but for pure ease of use and great features, nothing can touch the Google behemoth. There are so many Gmail features that it can often be difficult to keep track of them all. So here’s Android Authority’s ultimate guide to Gmail, with all the features you knew existed, and some you may not have known about.

Read also: How to set up and use Gmail in Outlook

Gmail is the email service set up and run by Google since 2004. At first, it was an invite-only service, but eventually, Google opened it up to anybody who wanted in. It was revolutionary because it offered more storage space than any other email platform at that time. In fact, Google claimed we would never have to delete another email ever again. Since its 2004 start, the service has come a very long way, with Gmail features being dropped and new ones being added all the time. It’s a constant work in progress.

However, if you need to connect your own domain email to Gmail (something like [email protected]), you’ll have to upgrade to the paid Google Workspace. The cost of Google Workspace is dependent on how many email addresses you create on your domain. Each email address works out at only a few dollars a month, and again, space can be upgraded, depending on your needs.

There are many reasons why Gmail has surged to the head of the email pack.

On the whole, Gmail and all associated Google services are available globally. However, there are some countries where that country’s government has blocked Google for political reasons. One classic example is China. Russia briefly blocked Gmail and other Google services in their dispute over Telegram, but this ban has now been lifted. Some other countries may also restrict access to Gmail. And Google may hold off from offering it others.

As with all political situations, things can change at any time, with restrictions being lifted in some places while being newly enforced in others. But in general, Gmail is available in most places across the world.

Also, bear in mind that Google doesn’t provide an account creation date, so if you need it for account recovery purposes, you should keep a backup of the Gmail welcome email in a safe place.

It’s straightforward to delete a Google account, and if you want, you can simply delete Gmail, but not the other associated Google services. You need to go to your Google Account page to get started. If you delete your Google/Gmail account, then have a change of heart, you do have a brief window of opportunity to recover it. But don’t hang about. The longer you wait, the slimmer your chances of getting the account back.

Because Gmail is the most popular and most used email service, Gmail users are a big target for hackers. There’s also a fair chance that, at some point, you’re going to find yourself locked out of your account.

Gmail should not be used for mass emailing, and if you do so, you’re risking your account being suspended by Google for misuse. Smaller mailing groups in Gmail are fine, though, and they work great if you belong to a club, informal group, or office environment.

For personal accounts, Google currently imposes a limit of 500 emails every 24 hours (or one email to 500 participants, for example). If you have a paid Google Workspace account, this limit rises to 2,000 emails every 24 hours.

IMAP is a feature that has largely replaced the POP protocol. When you’re using a local email program, such as Outlook, to access your emails, you need either POP or IMAP to transfer your emails. However, POP only downloads a copy of your emails to the local email program. If you reply to emails on your computer or delete anything, those changes aren’t reflected in your online account.

IMAP, on the other hand, is a two-way process. It downloads your emails to your computer and syncs your changes back to your online account.

Gmail currently doesn’t have an encryption function built-in, so you’ll need to rely on a third-party extension to do the job for you. The best one is FlowCrypt, and once you install the free extension, follow the on-screen prompts. It works using the PGP encryption protocol, but you don’t need to know about PGP to use FlowCrypt. The extension does an excellent job of doing the heavy lifting for you.

If you’re sold on Gmail, and you don’t want to use any other email platform ever again, then it’s time to start forwarding those emails. Most email platforms — with the exception of AOL apparently — support forwarding to another email service. The two main services — Yahoo and Outlook — make the whole process very easy. However, Yahoo only allows email forwarding if you’re using their paid plan.

Gmail has a good record for uptime and not suffering too many snafus and outages. However, there will be times when your emails may not be coming through as they should be. This is where our excellent troubleshooting guide will save the day. Whether you’ve run out of storage, you have a malfunctioning filter, your IMAP settings need fixing, or you’re running into issues with other Gmail features, you’ll soon find the cause.

Yes, the modern Gmail is suddenly colliding with 1990’s technology! If you have to deal with anyone still clinging onto their beloved fax machines, you can use Gmail to send a fax to them. If you’re willing to pay a monthly fee, you can set up a virtual fax number to receive faxes back into your Gmail inbox. When you set up a new fax account with Fax Plus, you can send up to a total of ten pages before being charged a nominal fee per page.

Gmail is now turning into your mother or spouse by nagging you to reply to emails. It will also scan your Sent box to see which of your emails have not been answered by the recipient so that you can chase them up. Useful? Perhaps to some people. But if you don’t like Google constantly poking you with a big stick, you can easily switch off this feature in the settings.

Gmail is also determined to save you as much typing time as possible with this productivity feature. If you find yourself typing the same email over and over, you can turn it into a template. Then, select the template next time you need it, and the email window will be prepopulated with the text. This one will change your life if you do a lot of emailing every day.

If you use your email for work or simply want to present a professional image, setting up an automatic email signature is a must. Gmail makes this simple. Go into the settings, then the General tab, then scroll down. You can insert HTML and an image, but on the whole, formatting options are a little on the thin side. Saying that, your Gmail signature shouldn’t have too many bells and whistles in it anyway.

Even though the trend these days is to move towards digital files and a paperless office, there will still be times when printing an email is necessary. To print an email in Gmail, click the printer icon at the top right of the screen. You will then see a properly formatted preview of the email, along with various other options.

If you want to forward some or all of your Gmail email, you can do this in the settings. You can set up a forwarding email address by going to the Forwarding and POP/IMAP section. You can also specify whether the original stays in the Gmail account or if it gets deleted or archived.

A: To personalize your Google/Gmail account, go to your Google account page, click on the image section, and upload your desired image. It may not appear straight away, though, as sometimes Google’s servers are slow to update.

A: If you’re constantly being redirected to the wrong Gmail account, then you need to sign out of all other logged-in accounts. Then log into the one you want to use by default. That one then becomes the default account.

A: At the bottom right-hand corner of the Gmail window is a link to a pop-up window. This window shows you all the recent times when someone (hopefully only you) logged into the account. You can then log off all other sessions, and if you don’t recognize an IP address, you can Google it.

A: CC means Carbon Copy, and BCC means Blind Carbon Copy. You can place the email address in the CC column when you’re sending out an email. This shows the primary email recipient that the person in CC has been copied into the email. If you would prefer that someone is secretly copied in, without the knowledge of the primary email recipient, then place the email address in the BCC column.

A: If the emails are still in the Trash bin, taking them out again is very easy. However, if the Trash bin has been emptied, getting emails back again is impossible.

A: You can only request read receipts in Gmail if you’re using the paid Google Workspace. The administrator of the Workspace account must switch on the read receipts feature, and it can take up to 24 hours for the feature to appear.

A: Only on Android devices, which can be switched on in the settings. On iOS, you must turn on dark mode in the settings for the entire phone. On the desktop, you need to enable the dark background theme for things to go black.

That concludes our Gmail features guide? Any questions? Ping us in the comments.