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The announcement comes exactly one year after Gmail - still officially a beta product - was first unveiled. In addition to increased storage, Gmail users can now use rich test formatting in their emails.

'Our goal is to make sure storage is no longer an issue for Web mail users,' said Marissa Mayer, Google's director of consumer Web products.

Gmail has revolutionised online email. When it was launched the most popular webmail services such as Yahoo! and Hotmail were offering less than 5MB of storage. Both have vastly increased their capacities since.

However concerns have arisen about the amount of personal information that Google stores. Google denies accusations of impropriety.

Other changes to Gmail in the past year include POP access, automatic forwarding, contact importing and signatures.