Gmail has become one of the highly used mail services in the world. Gmail is short for Google mail and it is one of the services offered by search engine pioneers, Google. Google is also a relatively new company when you compare it with the likes of Hotmail and Rediff, and for its service to have made a mark so quickly, there must be something special about Gmail. This article will take you through the development of Gmail in chronological order.

Started Back In 2004

We can trace the beginnings of Gmail to 2004 when email was not so extensively used as it is being used today. One of the selling points of Gmail was that it was a free web based mail service but so were Yahoo, Hotmail and Rediff. But Gmail also supported advertising in a different way and that was what probably made it one of the preferred mail services.

Paul Buchheit, Founder Of Gmail

Gmail was one of the many projects of Google’s founder Paul Buchheit and it had started out years ago on his desk space, before it was offered officially to the public. What started out as an internal email system for Google employees expanded into one of the most widely used email services in the world.

Long Beta Phase

Gmail had a prolonged beta phase of almost 5 years, which phase began in 2004. The company invited around a 1000 experts to open their accounts and gave them liberty to send invites to their friends and family. The trials officially started on the 21st of March, 2004.

April Fool’s Day Joke?

Google had acquired a reputation of being a company that played practical jokes on its patrons and since the company had announced the launch of the service on April 1st 2004, many people thought that it was one of those jokes. But these rumors were later dispelled when the company’s head cleared the air on national television.

Gmail Acquires Popularity Over Time

As more users were inducted into the Gmail community, the popularity of the service also grew and created frenzy. People started selling Gmail invitations on eBay and interestingly, there were many who wanted to buy them even though the price was as high as $150.

Over the years, Gmail has witnessed a number of changes in terms of the technicalities involved, the features offered and also the user interface. Over the history of Gmail, the email platform’s  popularity has only grown over the years; and there is no reason why it should not in the future also.

Grace is an expert with Cirrus Insight. Her interests lies primarily in writing and she loves to write about internet technology and marketing.