Google will stop scanning Gmail content for ad personalization

Changes coming to the way Google delivers ads within Gmail.

Google has decided to bring the consumer version of Gmail in alignment with the G Suite version of its widely popular email service, which is great news for the billion-plus users around the world. In a recent blog, after bragging about how popular its G Suite business has become amongst the enterprise community, Google announced that it would no longer scan consumer Gmail content for any ad personalization.



Currently, the free version of Gmail will scan the contents of your inbox for topics and then deliver relevant ads within Gmail. The example Google uses on its support page on the topic is if you've received a number of messages about photography or cameras, it might send you a targeted ad for a deal at a local camera store. Once the change happens later this year, Google will still deliver ads within the free version of Gmail, but they will be based on the ads settings associated with your Google Account, which adds topics you may like based on the things you consume or search for on other Google products — the videos you watch on YouTube, for example

This decision comes after Google saw G Suite usage more than double among large business customers over the past year, and as the total number of Gmail users continues to grow, adding over 200 million new users since Google announced it had surpassed 1 billion in 2016.