Massive Google Inbox update brings Trello, GitHub and Alerts integrations

Google Inbox is branching out. Starting with GitHub and Trello, Inbox will start surfacing to-do items that need your attention directly in-app.

The new features will be available via an update hitting iOS, Android and the Web today.

Project management platform Trello offers up a digital whiteboard to anyone who wants to use it. It’s great for planning huge projects, but equally good at keeping everyday life in order. With Inbox, changes to a Trello board are brought to your attention with details on what may have changed (and who did it).

GitHub’s integration relates directly to repositories, acting like a running changelog of what’s happening. If you’re managing or otherwise active in a GitHub repo, Inbox keeps you on top of the action.

Google Alerts are also getting some attention with Inbox. Alerts were recently made near real-time, and Inbox is now making your alerts more like a newsletter. It keeps a rolling summary of your Alerts, and each can be clicked on for more information.

Google Drive links can now be inserted directly into emails, and you can check permissions for those links directly in Inbox. If you receive an attachment, you can now save it directly to Drive as well.

Contacts are drag-and-drop friendly between the to, cc and bcc fields on the Web, and you can delete email in your inbox as well.

The idea behind all of this is speed and efficiency. Google would rather you get in, get stuff done and get on with your day. While it’s put a lot of effort into Inbox, you’ll likely be spending less time using it — and probably less time fussing with apps it integrates with as well.

This is likely just the beginning, too. Inbox was always Google’s new scheme for keeping us productive, and there are a lot of integrations users will likely want to see with Inbox.

My money is on an open API for Inbox at Google I/O 2017. With services like Facebook Messenger and iMessage having their own marketplace for apps within apps, a more open Inbox will probably get the same attention from Google somewhere down the line.