A computer-implemented method comprising: providing, within a messaging application, a user interface element for sending at least one file to a participant in an active message thread of the messaging application, wherein the participant is associated with a profile picture, wherein the at least one file is a photo having metadata, wherein the at least one file having been determined based on at least one of facial recognition, a time, or a place associated with the participant and the at least one file, to be relevant to the participant, wherein determining relevance to the participant based on facial recognition comprises matching the profile photo with a face in the at least one file, wherein the metadata comprises a time, a place and/or a category associated with the at least one file, and wherein determining relevance to the participant based on the time or the place associated with the participant and the at least one file comprises determining that information associated with the participant meets a predefined similarity threshold with metadata from the at least one file; and responsive to receiving a selection of the user interface element: transmitting, to a server associated with a cloud-based service, a request to store the at least one file in association with a shared storage area; and transmitting, via the messaging application, a message to the participant in the active message thread, the message comprising information for accessing the at least one file associated with the shared storage area, wherein the at least one file comprises a group of files, the group of files is represented as a single message element within the active message thread, and the single message element comprises a single message bubble that includes contextual information representing the group of files and obtained from metadata of one or more files in the group, wherein the contextual information comprises a representation of one of the group of files that has been determined by the cloud-based service to be a main file of the group of files, and wherein the contextual information indicates a current availability for accessing the group of files. providing, within a messaging application, a user interface element for sending at least one file to a participant in an active message thread of the messaging application, wherein the participant is associated with a profile picture, wherein the at least one file is a photo having metadata, wherein the at least one file having been determined based on at least one of facial recognition, a time, or a place associated with the participant and the at least one file, to be relevant to the participant, wherein determining relevance to the participant based on facial recognition comprises matching the profile photo with a face in the at least one file, wherein the metadata comprises a time, a place and/or a category associated with the at least one file, and wherein determining relevance to the participant based on the time or the place associated with the participant and the at least one file comprises determining that information associated with the participant meets a predefined similarity threshold with metadata from the at least one file; and responsive to receiving a selection of the user interface element: transmitting, to a server associated with a cloud-based service, a request to store the at least one file in association with a shared storage area; and transmitting, via the messaging application, a message to the participant in the active message thread, the message comprising information for accessing the at least one file associated with the shared storage area, wherein the at least one file comprises a group of files, the group of files is represented as a single message element within the active message thread, and the single message element comprises a single message bubble that includes contextual information representing the group of files and obtained from metadata of one or more files in the group, wherein the contextual information comprises a representation of one of the group of files that has been determined by the cloud-based service to be a main file of the group of files, and wherein the contextual information indicates a current availability for accessing the group of files. transmitting, to a server associated with a cloud-based service, a request to store the at least one file in association with a shared storage area; and transmitting, via the messaging application, a message to the participant in the active message thread, the message comprising information for accessing the at least one file associated with the shared storage area, wherein the at least one file comprises a group of files, the group of files is represented as a single message element within the active message thread, and the single message element comprises a single message bubble that includes contextual information representing the group of files and obtained from metadata of one or more files in the group, wherein the contextual information comprises a representation of one of the group of files that has been determined by the cloud-based service to be a main file of the group of files, and wherein the contextual information indicates a current availability for accessing the group of files.