Now chat from Gmail to a mobile through SMS

Even if the person you are chatting with is not available near PC you can chat with then using this new feature unveiled by Google Gmail – SMS Chat.

Leo Dirac, Google product manager says – “A few weeks back, we ran into a few snags when we first started rolling this out, but starting today you can turn on text messaging for chat,”

You get your own unique Google chat phone number, so the person receiving the texts will be able to know who you are by saving the digits under your name in their phone book.

How to enable Gmail SMS Chat? – just go to the Labs area in Settings to turn it on.

Then- you can type any US phone number into the search box in the chat window on the left, then select “Send SMS.“ You can also select the contact you want to SMS first and then add their phone number. You can send messages to US numbers from anywhere in the world. If you’re on the receiving end, when you get a text message from Gmail on your phone, messages from each contact will come from a unique number with a 406 area code (406 spells G0O…), reply like you would to any other text message and the reply will be routed through Gmail’s servers straight to your friend’s Gmail chat window.

How to block a Gmail sender while chatting from your mobile? Recipients can also block the service simply by sending the word BLOCK in response to a chat message, so you won’t be stung by pesky messages all day either.

Google is rolling out this service in the US at the moment, although it appears to be only a matter of time before it will be available in other geographies