Gmail Layouts not loading for users

[bethstaton]

ETA: Layouts worked for us BEAUTIFULLY until the first week of April 2024.

We are a tiny non-profit and rely heavily on Workspace. I have been encouraging my users to use the Layouts in Gmail.

• I have all of the access turned on for my users to utilize Gmail's Layouts. But they are still not able to save (and therefore can't share) layouts in Drive.
• The layout option appears for them, but doesn't load properly. Forgive the messy screenshots, but in duplicating their experience, this is what I see. They can choose one of the pre-made Layouts. In the preview it looks ok.
• But when they click to load it, the logo is not in the right place; in its spot is a spinning wheel that doesn't resolve. 
• When I close out, I get a "loading content" message. 

It's not urgent, but is something we had been relying on when it was easy and accessible. We just transitioned away from Spaces for a similar reason: it was so easy and accessible. But when it changed and was more embedded in Chat (which we don't use), it became obsolete for us. 

Any ideas, or is this another feature we just need to leave by the wayside? 

[Jan-Carlos]

Which license do you use?

As we can see in this documentation:

https://support.google.com/google-workspace-individual/answer/13397089?hl=en

It seems that only a few licenses can create custom layouts.

• Business Standard
• Business Plus
• Education Standard
• Education Plus
• Enterprise Standard
• Enterprise Plus
• Workspace Individual

[egambrell]

We are having the same issues - our licenses is Education Plus

[bethstaton]

Hi @Jan-Carlos - we use Google Workspace for Nonprofits. I should have included that we have had full access to Layouts and they had been working beautifully -- until last week. 

[loravan]

Same issues here! I've tried other browsers, incognito mode, nothing seems to work as of mid-last week. I'd love a fix as I have a whole campaign planned for next week using the layouts function!  😞

[bethstaton]

SAME!!! Now that I've gotten accustomed to Layouts, my campaign looks so plain using regular Gmail. 😖

[Simone_EN_Short]

Same here - we haven't been able to use them properly since at least Friday. Have tried clearing cache etc. but no luck.

[bethstaton]

I also tried everything I knew to do before posting here. Hopefully we can get an answer!

[Katherine]

Same issues with us! Hoping to see a fix soon...

[Ilex]

Me too! Tried to sent a message through Gmail Help, but no reply as of yet.

also tried different browsers/laptop and nothing seems to work 

[j-o-h-n-d]

I had not needed this recently until this morning, but now me too. 

[husdo]

It doesn't work for us as well. Can we get an ETA for the fix?

We use it for several communication, and it is a blocker now.

[bethstaton]

I wanted to add to this thread... when I follow this link (https://support.google.com/mail/answer/13397089?hl=en&sjid=4652193619504710710-NC) in this google help article (https://support.google.com/mail/answer/13397089?hl=en&sjid=4652193619504710710-NC) as seen here: 

I am given this Access Denied message. I'm a Super Admin, so I'm not sure what's up. When I first got this message a week ago, I went into our organizational settings and made sure the settings matched the instructions from Google. Still nothing. 

Again, Layouts were working beautifully for us until this month. If this feature was removed for our type of account, we didn't know ahead of time. Thanks everyone for the comments!

[j-o-h-n-d]

I saw that too. One thing that caught my eye, unless I am misremembering, is that the feature described just under it of being able to "Create a new email layout" I don't think has been there before. Wondering if they are working on a new feature and broke the old one, plus got ahead with their documentation? 

(BTW I also can't get to that second "Create a new email layout" link. I have a Business Standard account.) 

[bethstaton]

As of today, I can't do mail merges. I am assuming something must have changed for my account type. This is incredibly frustrating. 

[j-o-h-n-d]

Mail Merge still seems to be working for me, but the Layouts feature is still broken. 

[saraholivia]

Is there any work around? Do we know if this is reported to Google?

[bethstaton]

I've reported it but no reply yet. I will reach out again today. 

[egambrell]

Try the layouts now. They look different but seem to be working this morning.

[j-o-h-n-d]

Still not working for me, in the same way. 

[j-o-h-n-d]

Working for me as of now! Whew. 

[princetonpint]

Having the same issue - logo is in the wrong place and there is a spinning circle where the logo should be.

[BerylT · Accepted solution]

This seems to have been fixed by an update this morning (16th April) You need to make sure you have updated to the latest version eg restart if you're using a Chromebook. The new version allows you to create your own custom layouts, which looks like a useful feature.

[j-o-h-n-d]

Works for me now too, with the new feature of having your own templates. I had to restart my PC, not just Chrome. 

[michaelvaughn]

I saw the same problem last week, but it appears to be largely resolved with the update to Layouts. The one issue I'm seeing, that's likely more of an issue with Groups, is that Groups has a CSS declaration under the element element.style { that ruins the display of any images added through the Layout feature. This is the selector and its declarations in Groups:

element.style {
    border: 0;
    line-height: 100%;
    outline: none;
    text-decoration: none;
    display: block;
    font-size: 13px;
    min-height: auto;
    width: 100%;
    max-width: 600px;
}

Changing min-height to just height resolves the issue. Worth noting that the same selector in Gmail only uses height, not min-height, which is why Layout looks excellent in emails, but not in Group posts that were created via email. 

Ironically, if you:

1. Subscribe to receive emails from a group when a new post is made, then
2. Send a post to that Group via an email using Layouts, then
3. The post in the Group will have distorted images, but
4. The email you receive from the Group with the exact same post will look great because it's being viewed in Gmail

[DanMa]

Same problem. The logo in the wrong place and a spinning circle... How can we fix the problem? I've updated Chrome.

[j-o-h-n-d]

It has been working for me again for a while now, with new features to edit

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[DanMa]

For me too, finally !! Thank you.