Introducing Reminders and Unsubscribe features in Yahoo Mail

By Aditya Bandi and Shiv Shankar, Yahoo Mail Product Team

At Yahoo Mail, we’re always striving to provide more tools that help users manage their email inboxes as efficiently as possible. We’re now introducing two new features that will bring more organization and less clutter: our Reminders and Unsubscribe features.

Reminders

Users can now set reminders within emails to prioritize what matters the most to them. Real life example: just opened an email about the utility bill that’s due soon? Set a reminder to pay it in five days, and a notification will pop up then.

This feature has a notes section to add text, and can be set for a specific date and time in the future. To enable a quick set up, Reminders suggests which emails should have reminders and recommends timing, all based on email content. Reminders can always be edited, updated and deleted at any time through a “Manage Reminder” option. Plus, users can view inactive ones whenever they want.

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Unsubscribe

Implemented as an easy-to-find button when opening a message, the Unsubscribe feature lets users easily stop receiving emails without ever having to leave their Yahoo Mail inboxes. An option to unsubscribe from an email sender appears in each email. And in case users erroneously clicked the Unsubscribe button, they can reverse the unsubscribe action, up to three seconds after the initial click.

Our Unsubscribe feature helps keep inboxes clean and filled only with relevant content, making the entire unsubscribe process quick, efficient and stress-free. E-newsletter senders and email marketers should also find a benefit, as they’ll see a reduction in spam votes and be incentivized to deliver engaging high-quality content, since readers who are no longer interested will quickly be able to unsubscribe.

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Start Using These Features

Both of these new features are available immediately across iOS and Android, so start using them and let us know what you think. Also, be on the lookout for additional feature updates in the very near future. In fact, we’re already working on an unsubscribe recommendation option, where users can opt to receive automatic recommendations around which emails to unsubscribe from.

Have any suggestions for future Yahoo Mail updates? We’d love to hear them! If you’re using the mobile browser, go to the side panel and tap on “Send feedback.” If you’re using the Yahoo Mail app, go to Settings and tap on “Send feedback.”

Introducing Yahoo Together – group messaging just got organized

Adam Mathes, Senior Director, Product Management

Have you ever been in a group SMS thread with 10 people talking about 18 different things at once? It can make it hard to follow along, let alone plan a barbecue.

We built Yahoo Together to fix that. It’s group chat that makes life easier through organization and smart tools.

Gather people into the groups you care most about (family, friends, book clubs, bowling leagues) and then split up your conversations with topics. So instead of talking about 18 things at once, you can follow the topics you care about, and mute the rest.

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Sharing photos and videos also work great in Together, but we went beyond that to let you attach any file you want into a shared library for the group. And, instead of digging through your long text threads to find a message or attachment, powerful search helps you find all those easily.

Planning something with a group? Shared calendars are a hassle to set up and get people to use, so we often end up relying on messaging to do the reminding for us. We’ve automated that – you can attach a smart reminder to any message. The group will get notified at the scheduled time.

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We’ve also made it easy to respond in a single tap with a custom reaction. Our team has found that they quickly come to reflect our in-jokes and personal catchphrases –

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Watch our video to see Yahoo Together in action, and try it out with the groups you care about today! Download it now for iOS or Android.

9 Reasons to Create a Wedding-only Email Address with Yahoo Mail

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Say “I Do” with Yahoo.

You’re engaged and probably so excited to start planning this monumental day. But before you dive into your Pinterest boards and booking your appointments with catering, venue, cake, floral and dress / suit vendors, we’ve got a super important, must-do, #1 step before you start planning your big day—create your wedding-only email address with Yahoo Mail.

Why? Glad you asked, check out the 9 reasons below:

1. Say hello to a new, beautifully organized inbox.

Reason numero uno: weddings are CHAOS. Get your stuff together with an inbox dedicated to all the details where you can easily sort things into folders. You’ll have one consistent email address to distribute to guests, vendors and family.

Plus, Yahoo Mail has Views just for your document files so you can see all your PDFs and quotes in one fell swoop.

2. Keep your personal accounts separate.

You don’t want all this important wedding info to get buried in your main personal email inbox, do you? Your inbox doesn’t need more clutter. Think about it, once you start contacting vendors, you will start receiving a slew of emails.

By having an inbox just for the wedding, you’ll keep all those important (or frivolous) wedding emails in one place.

3. One shared email. 1,000 less arguments.

You and your soulmate can both have equal access to everything. No arguing about whether someone received a specific message or not from emails with the florist, DJ, or caterers.

If you get the Yahoo Mail app or logging in from your desktop, you can add all your accounts so they are all easily accessible: your wedding inbox, you work email, and your personal email. (even if it’s Gmail. We love everyone here.)

All your emails available in a few taps. Cake.

4. A way for people to email you their special moments.

Instead of downloading all those photos one by one from your wedding hashtag, why not ask folks to email their photos directly to you. You’ll have all those special pics easily viewable in your wedding inbox through the Photos View.

Plus you don’t have to worry about storage, ever. With 1000GB of storage, you’ll need to have over 500,000 photos just to fill it up.

5. Get money back without the hassle.

As a Yahoo Mail user, you have exclusive access to an Earny membership. What does that mean? Well it means automatic refunds when prices drop.

Really want those rose gold cufflinks but want to wait and see if they go on sale? No need. Buy now, and get money back automatically if the price drops.

6. Wedding purchases? Get free 2-day shipping and more.

With Yahoo Mail (in partnership with ShopRunner), you get 2-day FREE shipping! Right? It also includes free returns, exclusive deals, 140+ high-end retailers, and it’s normally $79/year.

7. Go digital with invites.

Did you know Yahoo Mail is the only email provider with digital stationery to dress up your messages? Not only that, they’re super cute. We’ve got artist-designed stationery from Paperless Post and original designs from our talented design team.

Pro Tip: Match your Paperless Post invites with some of their classic designs in Yahoo Mail.

8. People-only notifications.

Overwhelmed by all the messages you’re receiving? With Yahoo Mail, you can turn on People only notifications, so you can make sure you get that message from your florist, mother-in-law or officiant without all that extra noise.

9. Choose wisely.

Just say I Do with Yahoo! We even have a wedding tumblr blog for all your digital wedding tips and inspo. Check it out here.

Yahoo Mail for All: Introducing Our New Mobile Web Experience and Android Go App

By Joshua Jacobson, Senior Director of Product Management

By 2025, the number of global mobile internet users is predicted to expand by over 50%. We believe it is important to understand and meet the specific needs of this massive wave of new mobile users, and deliver the same first-class Yahoo Mail experience regardless of device, location, storage capacity, or network speeds.

As such, our team has been working to deliver on this promise of global access and equality and, today, we are proud to unveil two new major initiatives: 1. a completely modern Yahoo Mail mobile web experience, and 2. a new app optimized for Android Go phones.

New Mobile Web Experience: The Best Mail in your Browser

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In order to deliver a beautiful, high-quality Yahoo Mail experience no matter where you are in the world, it was critical for our team to make the mobile browser experience extremely fast and lightweight, while significantly improving current features. The difference between the old and new is striking.

The new, enhanced mobile browser experience shares many of the same features as the top-rated Yahoo Mail app with the added benefit of freeing up space, including:

  • Swipe through your inbox: The ability to take actions on emails quickly and easily by swiping right to mark as read and left to delete.
  • Customize your look and feel: New color themes with light and dark backgrounds that allow you to personalize your inbox.
  • Get organized easily with folders: Beautiful sidebar menu with folders for easy organization.
  • Never hunt for an email address: Auto-suggest your most frequent email addresses when you type the first few letters, so sending an email is faster than ever.
  • Infinite scrolling inbox: Scroll all the way down your inbox without having to hit “next” to see more emails.
  • Take quick action on emails: Easily delete, forward, reply and do more from the easy access toolbar once you open a message.

For convenience, you can add an icon to your home screen that links directly to the Yahoo Mail mobile browser experience. By introducing smooth transitions, an updated design, modern fonts, and native-like interaction animations, Yahoo Mail mobile browser takes what users love about our app experience and brings it to the web. If you’re already familiar with the app, using Yahoo Mail in your mobile browser will feel virtually indistinguishable, letting you jump right in without missing a beat.

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In addition to the dramatic feature and design updates, what’s changed for Yahoo Mail on mobile browser behind the scenes is equally as notable. The architecture supporting the new browser experience is the same as our modern desktop tech stack, which is developed on React and Redux. Further,

  • The enhanced version is written in JavaScript and built using Node.js. The basic version of Yahoo mobile web is written in PHP and built using Apache.
  • The enhanced version uses AJAX. The basic version uses form submit for all user actions.
  • In the enhanced version, there are no reloads – all actions (e.g., deleting, marking as read, marking as spam, emptying trash) are instant. The basic version reloads the page on every interaction.
  • The enhanced version is a fully interactive app-like experience. The basic version has limited interactivity.

As we look ahead toward future improvements (we’re always looking for new ways to give you what you want), whenever you launch Yahoo mobile web, your inbox will automatically access the most current code base. You’ll always have the latest and greatest experience, so no need to worry about missing out!

Yahoo Mail Go for Android Go: Same Yahoo Mail Speed and Reliability, but Lighter on your Data

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Our new mobile browser experience is just one part of how we’re delivering Yahoo Mail for everyone. Today we are also announcing Yahoo Mail optimized for the new Android Go devices (entry-level smartphones).  

The Yahoo Mail Go app delivers the same stunning features enjoyed by our current Android app users, while keeping the RAM usage on devices below 50MB and the install size below 10MB. In fact, the original Yahoo Mail app is already extremely lightweight, so we didn’t have to remove major features to reduce the standard Yahoo Mail app size for Go. And we did not compromise on performance – the Go app uses the exact same architecture as the standard Yahoo Mail app.

If you have a phone with the Android Oreo (Go edition) operating system and would like to download Yahoo Mail Go, follow this link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.yahoo.mobile.client.android.mail.lite.

No matter where you live in the world, what language you speak, or how you access Yahoo Mail, if you have any suggestions for future updates, we’d love to hear them. If you’re using the mobile browser, go to the side panel and tap on “Send feedback”. If you’re using Yahoo Mail Go, go to Settings and tap on “Send feedback”.

Yahoo Mail Makes Mother’s Day Emails Beautiful and Special, Just Like Mom

By Rachel Heit, Senior Director of Product Marketing

Mother’s Day is coming up fast and we know you have (hopefully) been diligently picking out the perfect gifts for all the moms in your lives. If you are out of ideas, though, our friends at Yahoo Search have pulled together some of the most searched-for gifts at the bottom of this post. After you’re done ordering your flowers, chocolates, picture frames, and more, the team here at Yahoo Mail wants to give you one last special gift to send: a heartfelt note delivered on beautiful, personalized stationery.

Through Mother’s Day on Sunday, May 13th, you can now easily send emails on our Mother’s Day-themed stationery by clicking “compose”, then choosing the folded “stationery” card. Don’t worry if you’re the forgetful type – Yahoo Mail will remind you before Mother’s Day to make sure you stay her favorite daughter, son, grandchild, spouse, or friend:

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Once you tap, you can choose from a number of hand-crafted designs that look beautiful no matter if she opens it on the go or sitting at home in front of her computer. Your card will look perfect no matter what:

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If your mom loves GIFs just as much as gifts, Yahoo has you covered there as well. To add a little more personality to your email, you can select from our hand-picked selection of Mother’s Day GIFs or just search for “love”, “hearts”, “puppies”, “flowers” or anything else that speaks to your love for Mom and pick the perfect animated add-on for your card.

Did you know that Mother’s Day is celebrated on the same day in over 90 countries around the world? To give moms across the globe little more love, Mother’s Day stationery is available for Yahoo Mail users on desktop and mobile (Android, iOS) in the US, Canada, Germany, India, Brazil, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong.

Need inspiration? Here are Yahoo Search’s Mother’s Day insights:

If you’re stumped for the perfect gift to get Mom, there’s no shame in turning to the wisdom of the crowd. The Yahoo Search team poured over 2017 and 2018 U.S. search data to identify the top gifts and help you find something special. Check out the lists below:

Gifts consistently in the top 10 for 2017 & 2018:

Unique gift ideas – some of the more popular searches out of the top 10:

Gifts to avoid – dropped well out of the top 10 for 2018:

It Pays To Be A Yahoo Mail Member: You do the shopping, we’ll help you save

By Michael Albers, VP of Product Management

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Changes to the inbox over the years have focused primarily on the productivity of managing lots of emails. Today, the Yahoo Mail team is happy to announce that we have been working on something that we think brings even more value to our hundreds of millions of members … and we are just getting started.

We are building automation into the inbox to help Yahoo Mail members find the best shopping deals and coupons, get the lowest price on what they buy and improve their online shopping service. Specifically:

  • Find deals on items you care about 
  • Get the best price on recent purchases
  • Faster shipping on your online purchases

The new Yahoo Mail features will help keep you organized and on top of your shopping game. These services, partnerships and smart features are available to access in the Yahoo Mail experience, and will only grow and evolve to deliver even greater benefits to Yahoo Mail members.

Saving you time and money with our innovative partners: ShopRunner (Free two-day shipping, free returns, & seamless checkout) and Earny (Price protection on purchases).

ShopRunner offers millions of members free two-day shipping, free returns, and seamless checkout at over 100 retailers. Normally it costs $79 to join ShopRunner, but thanks to our new partnership, Yahoo members get their first-year subscription with ShopRunner absolutely, 100% free. ShopRunner offers shoppers the world-class shopping experiences at a wide network of retail partners.  

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Earny is another company we’ve partnered with because we never want you to overpay on any recent purchases. As a loyal Yahoo member, once you sign up for Earny, you will automatically get refunds for eligible purchases.

Here’s how it works:  Earny reviews up to your last 90 days of purchases from eligible retailers, and automatically processes refund requests on your behalf when lower prices are discovered online. If you paid $60 at one retailer and Earny finds it for $45.00 somewhere else, you’ll be refunded the difference. It’s that easy, so don’t delete your receipts, there are potential savings to be had!  

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Keeping your shopping life organized: Coupons and Purchase Views

Finally, we are adding two new useful ways to look at important shopping information in your inbox. The Coupon and Purchase views.

In the Coupon view, you will find the deals and coupons we have found in your inbox all organized for easy use. We will keep track of expiration dates, and if you ask us to “clip” a coupon, we will notify you before it expires.

In the new Purchase view, all your purchases are organized to make looking up a delivery or receipt quick and easy. Over time, we will include the price protection and tracking information in this view.

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This is just the beginning of a lot more to come from Yahoo Mail this year. We always welcome our members’ feedback so please tell us what you think.  

Yahoo Mail Wins Winter Game Gold

By Jeff Bargmann, Product Manager for Yahoo Mail

As teams of elite athletes from around the world gear up for the 2018 Winter Games in PyeongChang, South Korea, the team here at Yahoo Mail has been working hard to bring all of the excitement and drama of the Medal Hunt to your inbox.

Our goal here at Yahoo Mail is to give you an inbox experience that keeps you organized and, most importantly, on top of what matters most to you - including coverage of the Winter Games.

Starting today, fans using Yahoo Mail can easily stay tuned into every competition and cheer on your country, teams and athletes right from your inbox. Here’s how:

On your desktop - Medal Counter and Yahoo Sports Breaking News

When you log into Yahoo Mail during the games, you will see a real-time medal counter on the upper right of your inbox, letting you keep track of which country is winning the medal race and celebrate each time your country reaches the podium. 

In partnership with Yahoo Sports, Yahoo Mail will also deliver all of the leading and latest Winter Games news headlines in real-time. To get the full story and breaking Winter Games news, simply click on the arrow to be taken to the Yahoo Sports destination page for the Winter Games.

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On mobile - Breaking News with Just a Tap

Of course, we know you will want to stay on top of the Games while you’re on the move so, once again, we’ve worked with the Yahoo Sports team to create a dedicated News section that brings you all of the latest headlines right in your inbox.

To check out the news, just tap on that handy Medal icon in the upper right-hand corner of your inbox.

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Once you tap the medal, you’ll head over to the Yahoo Sports destination page for the Winter Games, bringing you the very best, up to the minute coverage of all the pageantry, drama, heartbreak, and joy of the Games.

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This is a limited time feature available to Yahoo Mail users for both our desktop and mobile (iOS and Android) applications in the US, Canada, United Kingdom, France, and Germany. Download the latest in the App Store, Google Play or visit Yahoo Mail on your computer. Let us know what you think — just go to Settings and tap “Send Feedback.”