Customize Gmail and remove the clutter with Minimalist Gmail

By Sharninder | Published: November 13, 2009

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Gmail is one of the world’s most popular free email services and is definitely my favorite email service. The reasons that I like Gmail for are simple enough. In my opinion, the reason Gmail is so popular is because Google really goes the extra mile to ensure that the Interface remains as clutter free as possible.

Even the advertisements that Google displays are all kept as discreet as possible and for people who don’t like to see ads, they even provide IMAP/SMTP as an option for those users.

Google has so far done a very good job of keeping the web based interface of Gmail clean and (mostly) clutter free. But, over the years as google has added features to Gmail, the interface, the two sidebars in particular, have become a little cluttered.

And to satisfy the power users, they’ve even gone so far as to implement a separate Labs section where they release features that are not considered ready for prime time. If you have a couple of these features enabled, they clutter the sidebar even more.

So, what are your options if you want to use the web based interface of Gmail but still want it to be as clutter free as your desktop email client ?

Minimalist Gmail is an Add-on for Firefox that lets you remove all the clutter from Gmail’s web interface and still retain the functionality.

Installation, like any other Firefox Add-on, is a breeze and the first time you load Gmail after installation, you’ll notice that Minimalist Gmail has already started it’s work.

Minimalist Gmail

The default settings of the extension remove the chat window, remove the line that separates individual emails, remove the Invite button and makes a couple of other handy modifications. But, if the this is too, well, Minimal for you, you can customize the look by clicking on the MinimalistGmail button at the top right corner of the page.

Minimalist Gmail Options

As you can see there are a fair bit of customization options that Minimalist Gmail takes care of. If you’re fan of Leo Babauta … or very brave, go ahead and select all the options for the ultimate in Gmail Minimalism.

About Sharninder:

Programmer, blogger and a geek making a living shifting bits around the Internet. Sharninder is the owner of Geeky Ninja