What it is advisable to know
- A brand new replace to the Gmail app for Android tablets brings the side-oriented navigation rail to customers.
- Beforehand, the characteristic was out there on Android foldable when the primary display was opened.
- The navigation rail frees up vertical house within the Gmail app, changing the underside navigation bar.
A server-side replace to the Gmail app has introduced Google’s new navigation rail to Android tablets. The characteristic was first noticed by 9to5Google, beginning with model 2023.11.12.x of the Gmail app. Because of the server-side replace, the navigation rail is on the market on most Android tablets now.
Google makes use of a backside bar for UI navigation in plenty of its cellular apps, like most cellular app builders. That is sometimes an intuitive strategy to change views, entry completely different options, and navigate pages. Nonetheless, it is a UI aspect that works a lot better on smartphones with much less horizontal house out there than on widescreen tablets.
For some time, Google’s apps for Android tablets had been principally scaled-up variations of the native Android app. However over the previous couple of years — within the lead-up to the discharge of Google’s Pixel Fold and Pixel Pill — there was a larger emphasis positioned on growing apps particularly for larger-screened Android units.
Final yr, Google launched a brand new navigation rail on foldable telephones, together with the Pixel Fold. This transfer shifted the normal backside bar over to the left-hand facet of the display. Now, the identical change is happening on Android tablets.
Within the above instance, you’ll be able to see the brand new sidebar barely decreases the quantity of house in your inbox checklist. This might be a non-issue on tablets with massive shows, because it’s barely a priority on folding telephones. The previous Gmail app design arguably wasted an excessive amount of house on the inbox checklist, because it took up almost half of the out there display house.
The navigation rail can maintain as much as 4 icons and can replicate the icons that used to reside within the backside navigation bar. These are Gmail, Chat, Areas, and Meet. The toggles are proper across the heart of your display, to the left. It is proper the place your thumb needs to be when holding an Android pill, so it needs to be pretty intuitive and ergonomically sound to press.
It’d rely in your machine’s display dimension, however typically, the navigation rail will solely seem in a horizontal orientation. While you shift your machine vertically, the underside navigation bar returns.
The variety of icons in your navigation menus — and which of them are there — may rely upon whether or not you have gotten the Google Chat redesign but. Most units ought to have the UI overhaul by now, however some customers will nonetheless see the previous structure.
To see if you happen to’ve gotten the brand new navigation bar, be certain that your Gmail app is up-to-date and use your Android pill in a horizontal orientation.
