Infographic: Looking back at Gmail on its 9th birthday

[Matthew DeCarlo]

It's hard to imagine Google without its spaghetti bowl of web services, but less than a decade ago it didn't even provide email. Gmail shook up the Internet when it entered beta on April Fool's Day, 2004, offering handy features such as threaded conversations as well as a whole gigabyte of storage -- 20 times what you'd get for free elsewhere. The catch at the time, of course, was that you could only get in with an invite, which promptly flooded eBay and commanded a premium of more than $100 at one point.

With its luxuries, it didn't take long for Gmail to attract a following. As of last year the service was used by nearly half a billion people across 57 languages and according to comScore, it has overtaken Hotmail as the world's top email provider. Celebrating that success and the iterative process it takes to achieve, Google has commemorated Gmail's ninth birthday with an infographic mapping the service's lengthy list of milestones, from the day it dropped invitations in 2007 through exiting beta in 2009 and beyond:

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https://www.techspot.com/news/52210-infographic-looking-back-at-gmail-on-its-9th-birthday.html

 

[Jad Chaar]

Wasn't the new compose feature before the 28th? I have had it for a while.

 

[asdf]

I stopped using Gmail since they are scanning all my emails and then send spam and ads. I don't have time to waste and make Google rich. Back to Hotmail (Outlook), love the new Modern and simple interface.

 

[Julio Franco]

Gmail rocked the email world and to this day remains the best web client by far (in my opinion anyway). Ads can get annoying but for some reason on my main account I don't get any. I've opened a few more accounts for other people and I know those get ads, but I don't, so crossing fingers there. Also I find the transition to the new compose questionable and unnecessary, we will see where that leads.

 

[slh28]

Gmail has always been the best web based email service, I don't mind making Google rich considering how much storage you get and how awesome it's been.

 

[Timonius]

What Ads? :O

 

[Guest]

I stopped using Gmail since they are scanning all my emails and then send spam and ads. I don't have time to waste and make Google rich. Back to Hotmail (Outlook), love the new Modern and simple interface.

Huh? The Hotmail/Outlook does pretty much same. When you open your email and you will see the ads match to your topic of email. How do you think Hotmail/Outlook makes money while they provide the service for free? I hope you are smart enough to figure this question. It's very clearly that the only reason why you hate Google is that they got big and successful.

 

[Jad Chaar]

Gmail rocked the email world and to this day remains the best web client by far (in my opinion anyway). Ads can get annoying but for some reason on my main account I don't get any. I've opened a few more accounts for other people and I know those get ads, but I don't, so crossing fingers there. Also I find the transition to the new compose questionable and unnecessary, we will see where that leads.

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