📧 google's inbox is going away

Today, Google dropped this bomb. As with thousands of others, I'm sad to see Inbox go. It was a fresh take on email, which offered some great features.

Google does indicate that by shutting down Inbox, they'll be putting more effort into Gmail. But as we all know, even with it's new look in the browser, Gmail is still far behind Inbox. I want to see a few things come to Gmail.

automatic bundling

One of the best things that Inbox did automatically was bundle information related to a particular trip for you. It could gather emails about your flight, hotel, and rental car and group them in a bundle. I also created my own bundle for builds and releases of my different software projects.

Google's transition guide suggests using inbox tabs, rules, and labels to create the same effect. But what they're actually doing is asking you to recreate the logic rather than providing it automatically.

todos and reminders

I never understood Google's strategy when it comes to tasks and/or reminders. They have apps and services all over the place. They've got reminders in Inbox, notes in Keep, emails in Gmail, and appointments in Calendar. And Google now offers a standalone app to handle your todo list called Tasks.

It seems as though some sense of organization is on its way though. With the updated Gmail site, Google has placed Keep and Tasks in the sidebar. This should be an indication that those will be the go to apps from here on out. The one thing that is missing is integrating the reminders feature of Calendar with the rest of the system. You should be able to create reminders from emails and tasks which show up on the calendar.

mobile app

While Gmail on the web got a major user interface upgrade, the mobile app was left behind. Gmail still has the same dated utilitarian look as it ever did. But besides looks, it also lacks a really great feature.

The Inbox app does this awesome thing where it pulls out any attachments from the email and displays them in the email summary, so you can click on them without having to actually open the email. Gmail needs this so bad to make it more usable on mobile devices.

switching

Even though Gmail isn't where it needs to be, I'm going to switch over to using it sooner rather than later so that I can have my workflows all set up by the time Inbox goes bye bye.

Are you going to cut the cord on Inbox now, or wait until March 2019?
Are you switching back to Gmail, or looking for a new client?

I'm interested to hear your responses, let me know @bradgarropy.