Google has added support for ZIP and RAR files to the Google Docs Viewer. That means if you get a one of these files as an attachment in Gmail, you’ll be able to view its contents within the browser when you click “view”.

“ZIP and RAR archives that are embedded inside other archives also work,” says Avner Aviad on the Google Docs Viewer team. “For example, if you have a RAR file inside a ZIP file (like in our example above) you can just click on that file to access the embedded archive.”

“We hope this removes the need to download full archives when you only need to work on select items,” Aviad adds.

The feature also works on mobile devices.

Here is the complete list of file types the Google Docs Viewer supports:

• Microsoft Word (.DOC and .DOCX)
• Microsoft Excel (.XLS and .XLSX)
• Microsoft PowerPoint (.PPT and .PPTX)
• Adobe Portable Document Format (.PDF)
• Apple Pages (.PAGES)
• Adobe Illustrator (.AI)
• Adobe Photoshop (.PSD)
• Tagged Image File Format (.TIFF)
• Autodesk AutoCad (.DXF)
• Scalable Vector Graphics (.SVG)
• PostScript (.EPS, .PS)
• TrueType (.TTF)
• XML Paper Specification (.XPS)
• Archive file types (.ZIP and .RAR)

Google is doing more to improve Google Docs. As reported this week, the company announced the new features it is prioritizing, based on user feedback. These include: adding better header/footer functionality, offline availability, and creating vertical merging in spreadsheets.