The Gmail app finally lets you un-send embarrassing emails

We’ve all been there: a hastily typed-out email has been sent to the wrong person, or worse, hit by an embarrassing spelling mistake thanks to your iPhone’s over-enthusiastic autocorrect function.

But Gmail has added a new feature that will spare your blushes. An update to the email service’s iOS app now lets you undo emails you have sent erroneously.

The new feature comes as part of the biggest redesign of the Gmail iPhone app in four years that makes it look similar to the version for Android as well as adding a few new features.

Google added the undo send feature to its email service for the web last year as well as for Android, but it has long been one of the most-needed features on the iOS version.

When you send an email, a black bar will appear at the bottom of the screen giving you the chance to undo it for five seconds. During this time, the app is essentially holding the email in quarantine until the five seconds expires, at which point it will actually be sent.

If you undo, you’ll be taken back to the email compose screen at which point you can make any necessary tweaks to the email. The feature works whether or not you have “undo send” activated on the web version of Gmail.

Gmail has also vastly improved the search function, making it quicker and adding search suggestions. You can also swipe right or left on emails to archive them.

Undo send has been a feature in other email apps such as Spark and Google’s own Inbox for some time.