New Yahoo! Mail adds free text messaging to US, Canada, India and the Philippines

Yahoo has just announced the new version of its popular web-based email client – Yahoo Mail. The main addition of the new version which we care about is the ability to send free text messages to any mobile phone number in the US, Canada, India and the Philippines. The feature is seamlessly incorporated into the new Yahoo! Mail, and all you have to do is enter a mobile phone number into the “To:” field, type your text message and hit sent. Let’s hope Yahoo will add support for more countries in the near future, and other web-mail providers will follow with similar offerings…

In addition to free SMS, Yahoo also integrated instant messaging into the new Yahoo! Mail, allowing users to chat with their Yahoo! Messenger and Windows Live Messenger 2 buddies from the web environment. Finally, the new version of Yahoo! Mail should be more stable and run more smoothly… Check out the full release after the jump.

Sunnyvale, CA – August 27, 2007 – Yahoo! Inc., today announced the general availability of the new version of Yahoo! Mail, one of the world’s most popular Web mail services, providing people with more ways to connect to their friends and online contacts. The new service includes two real-time communication features that are the first of their kind from a leading Web mail service. These include the ability to send free text messages from Yahoo! Mail to mobile phone numbers in the US, Canada, India, and the Philippines, and the ability to send instant messages (IM) from Yahoo! Mail to members of the world’s largest combined IM community, including users of Yahoo! Messenger and Windows Live Messenger2.

The new version of Yahoo! Mail also includes speed and performance enhancements as well as productivity refinements, and will begin rolling out to users worldwide today. Yahoo! will continue to offer Yahoo! Mail Classic, its award-winning, traditional Web mail interface, providing users a choice between experiences.

“We have always been focused on making it easy for people to connect to those who matter most to them, and during the beta testing period of the new Yahoo! Mail, we were able to incorporate a number of enhancements based on valuable feedback from our users,” said John Kremer, vice president, Yahoo! Mail. “Now, with the all-new Yahoo! Mail, we’re creating a more social e-mail experience. In addition, we wanted to make sure that people have the best possible Web mail experience regardless of their geographic location, preferences or system, so we’re continuing to offer our trusted Yahoo! Mail Classic interface.”

Integrated Text Messaging and Instant Messaging

The new Yahoo! Mail enables people to select how they want to communicate with their online contacts: via e-mail, instant message or text message to a mobile phone number. With the introduction of this text messaging feature, which is built on Yahoo!’s IM platform, people can now choose to send free text messages from Yahoo! Mail to mobile numbers in the US, Canada, India and the Philippines in real-time without leaving the Web mail experience. The feature is seamlessly incorporated into the new Yahoo! Mail, and is as easy as entering a mobile phone number, typing a text message and hitting send.

The new Yahoo! Mail also enables users to connect in real-time to their contacts within Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Messenger or Windows Live Messenger. This instant messaging interoperability connects users of one of the world’s largest Web mail services with the world’s largest combined IM community and facilitates quick chat conversations within the Yahoo! Mail interface. People can also easily convert their e-mail messages into IM chats or switch to a text message dialogue with the click of a button, when friends come online or go mobile, and vice-versa.

Additional features of the new Yahoo! Mail

Other new productivity and personalization features in the new Yahoo! Mail include:

• Speed and performance – the new Yahoo! Mail is faster and more responsive than previous beta versions
• Search refinements – users can now refine their e-mail search results using advanced search options, including the ability to narrow results by sender, folder, date, attachment type and message status to pinpoint specific queries
• Shortcuts (U.S. only) – users are now able to right click on underlined dates, names and keywords within messages and take additional action, such as adding events directly to their Yahoo! Calendars, adding friends to their Contacts, immediately viewing a Yahoo! Map of an address, or performing a Web search on a keyword
• Color themes – users can personalize the look of their e-mail experience with six customizable color themes

Overall, the new Yahoo! Mail also offers a more dynamic Web 2.0 experience, including a sleek, easy-to-use interface with the speed and responsiveness of a desktop application. In addition to integrated text messaging and instant messaging, it features other enhanced capabilities such as tabbed navigation, a reading pane, an integrated calendar and an RSS reader.

A co-branded version of the new Yahoo! Mail will also be available in the fall to customers using the following broadband Internet services: AT&T Yahoo! High Speed Internet, Verizon Yahoo! and Rogers Yahoo! Hi-Speed Internet. The new Yahoo! Mail will be available this fall to Yahoo! Small Business Mail users as well.

Both the new Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Mail Classic are free services with unlimited e-mail storage, accessible from virtually any computer or mobile device connected to the Internet, without the need for a software download.