At the end of the past week, Microsoft labeled the Wave 3 update due for Windows Live Hotmail as “coming soon.” Traditionally, the Redmond company rolls out Windows Live Hotmail upgrades gradually to all users of the service over a period of several weeks, and this is the main reason why the Wave 3 upgrade is yet to be available to the vast majority of the users of Microsoft's email service. However, according to the Redmond giant, Windows Live Hotmail Wave 3 brings to the table a range of improvements, from an overhauled graphical user interface to a performance boost and enhanced spam filtering.

“We’ve done a little remodeling, and we think Hotmail looks much, much nicer and is easier to use. We did a lot of testing around the world to see what people liked and didn’t like. We’re really excited about the final results, and we hope you like it too! There’s also a whole new set of vibrant themes that replace our old color schemes,” revealed Lead Program Manager, Windows Live Hotmail, Mike Schackwitz.

Windows Live Hotmail Wave 3 brings an intimate connection between the Classic and Full versions of the service. First off, Microsoft worked to bring the Full flavor of the service on par with the Classic version in terms of speed but, at the same time, to make the same range of features available for both variants. Additionally, with Windows Live Hotmail Wave 3, Microsoft has revamped the experience of managing Contacts, and offered a comprehensive integration of email with the updated Calendar beta.

“We completely redesigned the experience of composing a new message. We have brand new auto-complete functionality for e-mail addresses, and a new contact picker that even detects commonly misspelled addresses. There is a new way to attach files and a new spell-checker that we think are much easier to use (especially if you were using Classic – no need to go to a new page to attach files anymore!). The text editor is completely rewritten, and we fixed a bunch of bugs – right-click now works,” Schackwitz added.