---
title: "Gmail Ads Within Email Thread – Is This New?"
date: 2009-09-06
author: "Richard MacManus"
categories:
  - name: "ReadWriteWeb"
    url: "/category/readwriteweb.md"
tags:
  - name: "2009"
    url: "/tag/2009.md"
---

# Gmail Ads Within Email Thread – Is This New?

![](https://web.archive.org/web/20090921025427im_/http://www.readwriteweb.com/images/gmail_logo_apr09.png)Today I spotted a contextual advert ***within*** an email thread in Gmail. Usually these ‘sponsored links’ are displayed in a separate pane on the right-hand side of Gmail – i.e. outside of the actual email content. But this places the ad squarely within the content of the email thread. It’s possible this has been around for a while, but if so I only just noticed it. I took a couple of screenshots – let us know in the comments whether you’ve seen this before.

![](https://web.archive.org/web/20090921025427im_/http://www.readwriteweb.com/images/gmail_ad_inthread.jpg)*Screenshot showing full ad – this displayed above the message I’d just sent and below the previous message in the thread.*

![](https://web.archive.org/web/20090921025427im_/http://www.readwriteweb.com/images/gmail_ad_inthread2.jpg)*Close-up screenshot showing a bit more detail of ad placement.*

Note: When I re-entered the email thread, the ad above no longer displayed inside the thread. So I’ve not been able to re-create this scenario.

*Originally published on ReadWriteWeb ([archived copy](https://web.archive.org/web/20020204040018/http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/gmail_ads_within_email_thread_-_is_this_new.php))*