Google’s Inbox is a divisive tool, love it or hate it, they’re certainly pushing the boundaries of functionality on email with some unique new features. Unlike Gmail, Google has opted to bring some things to mobile first, like Smart Reply which they introduced in November last year, but Google has today announced it will now be available for those using Inbox on the web.
Smart Reply uses AI functions to suggest three automated ‘natural language responses’ to emails received in Inbox. The smart replies are generally quite brief, but seem to be quite good at picking up the context of the email and suggesting a brief but relevant reply to send back.
Smart reply is being used by Inbox users too, with Google advising that 10% of replies on mobile use smart reply.
The suggestions on mobile pop up at the bottom of the email you’re reading and will look similar on the web, simply click the reply you think is relevant and save yourself some time.
You won’t see Smart Replies to every email in your Inbox, but they will come up when Google’s AI engine can come up with something relevant. Try it out and see what you think.
I’m not sure how I feel about this. It’s a little bit like your postman delivering a postcard to you and commenting that “it looks like your sister is having a good time on her holiday!”
Sure, I ‘know’ that my postman ‘can’ read some of my mail, but I sort of trust him/her not to. To actually have Google’s mail app read and analyse my correspondence in order to make suggestions to me, just ‘feels’ like a step too far.