Ocean’s new app brings inbox triage, tasks and invites to Gmail users

A groundbreaking personal productivity application named Ocean is set to enhance how users manage their overflowing Gmail inboxes. This innovative app allows users to streamline their email management by converting messages into actionable tasks and sharing their availability for meetings—all within one platform. In a landscape where Gmail reigns supreme in the email domain, Ocean has opted for collaboration over competition. The app serves as a third-party client, acknowledging the challenges of penetrating such a saturated market. Notably, successful email applications have historically attracted significant acquisitions, like Yahoo's $60 million purchase of Xobni and Microsoft's $200 million acquisition of Accompli in the last decade. Co-founders Martin Dufort and Scott Lake, a former Shopify co-founder, established BigWaveLabs in 2019, aiming to revolutionize email management. Their efforts birthed Ocean, which is designed to work seamlessly with Gmail and Google Workspace accounts. Users can effortlessly transform emails into tasks, ensuring important actions are never overlooked. Ocean’s built-in Task Manager integrates directly with users' emails, eliminating the need to transfer information to external to-do applications. This feature enriches the task management experience with advanced capabilities beyond what Google’s native task manager offers. Users can format tasks richly, assign due dates, categorize tasks into folders, and even link emails to their task notes. Additionally, the app can extract action items from lengthy emails automatically, making it easier to stay on top of important communications. For those who strive for inbox zero, Ocean's triage tools are a game changer. The app enables users to filter emails by various categories, including first-time senders and frequent contacts, and even highlights emails that may have been misclassified as spam, ensuring that nothing vital slips through the cracks. In addition to its core functionalities, Ocean also provides subscription management features—mirroring a recent Gmail update—and standard email operations such as composing, replying, and organizing emails. A standout aspect of Ocean is its integrated meeting scheduling capabilities, allowing users to define their availability based on current commitments. This feature helps prevent last-minute meeting requests and includes automated email invitations, confirmations through a web interface, and automatic calendar entries for confirmed meetings. The Ocean app is now available for iPhone users, with a Mac version on the horizon that will support iCloud synchronization. The company plans to monetize through a non-recurring subscription model, Ocean Blue, priced at $67. However, new users can explore the app with a 14-day free trial that does not transition into a paid subscription automatically.