Gmail gets multi-attachment uploading

Gmail users can now select multiple attachments and add them simultaneously to an e-mail message. The new system simply opens your operating system's file explorer, and supports selecting of multiple files at once. Best of all, it includes a status bar for each file as it uploads (just like Flickr's Flash uploader does) to let you know how far along each file is. This can be comforting if you're adding a file that's close to Gmail's 20MB attachment limit, since you can see something other than a spinning loading icon. It also warns you if you're over the size limit before the files start moving, which is a nice touch.

One area where desktop e-mail programs still beat Gmail is letting users drag and drop their files, which has been seen to work on other Web storage and upload services using a Java applet.

You can now add multiple files at once, and see how far along each one is with upload status bars.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

[Hunnter2k3]

Aw man, when did the attachment size change to 20MB?
I've been sitting here like a lemming thinking it was 10MB still.

If only i had read updates more often, this would have saved me a lot of time with attachments.
But this will save even more time now, no need to archive loads of files now.

[dexter_birdbrain]

Actually, irrespective of the attachment size and limit, you should archive (zip) your attachments (especially Office attachments) in case they are more than 50 kilobytes. Its akin to being a "good Samaritan" on the Internet because you will save a whole lot of bandwidth while doing that. :-)

[Cheese McBeese]

It always amazes me to see the Google fan-boys and fan-girls celebrate Google achievements that are a decade behind the rest of the industry. Gmail supports multiple attachments... woo hoo! Now tell me what credible email program hasn't been doing that for years. How about that Chrome browser! It's fast! Well... if you strip out 90% of the functions of IE, Firefox or Safari so that functionality is on par with Chrome, I suspect they'll all run a lot faster too! I'm not a member of the Google cult. I'm not even a fan of their search engine. Unless you know exactly what you're looking for, your searches return a jumbled mess of promotions and useless information that is totally out of context for what you're looking for.

Where's the beef?!!

[carlg113]

yahoo stockholder?

[akirandres]

definitely a yahoo stockholder. :P

[HakNick]

We've been doing multiple uploads for years now ... and we have no billions

[InfoMonger]

Umm....the beef is being able to select multiple files at once inside the same "select file" dialog box. And also having accurate progress bars for each attachment. Show me Yahoo Mail or Hotmail being able to do either.

[plantlord]

Cool, that's handy!

[cuwickliffe]

That is handy. I think while file progress bars are old, this is a nice touch to Gmail because at least for me file uploads didn't happen immediately and I had no idea how close they were to completing. Now instead of a 10-second wait on a small file, it begins uploading immediately. I'm one of these blokes who add the attachment last, so that keeps my wait to a minimum.