For the free mobile e-mail lovers out there, there's good news. Google has updated its mobile Gmail client and there are a host of improvements. The killer new feature? Search, of course.

The mobile Gmail client has always had its strong points and weak points. Score four for Google, though, because it bolstered the mobile client with some truly useful updates.

Not only does it look more like the Web version of Gmail, but it is also faster. It has been streamlined for fewer clicks to get to your inbox. Google also has reduced the amount of data the application consumes. This will save money for those who have limited data plans, but it also means that mails will load and send faster.

One of the biggest weak points of the previous version is that the mobile client didn't always sync well with the standard version. Often you would send an e-mail from your phone and it would fail to appear in the Sent folder in the Web Gmail app. Well, this is no longer a problem. Google has fixed it so that e-mails sent from phones will now always appear in the Web version of Gmail.

Perhaps the greatest improvement is what Google is known best for, and that is searching. I use the search functionality of the Web Gmail application constantly. With some 25,000 e-mails in my inbox, it is absolutely necessary to find certain bits of information quickly. Now the power of searching your inbox for messages or information comes to your mobile phone with an integrated search feature in the Gmail client.

The application is free and available for download here. This will add more fuel to the mobile Google services fire, for sure.