You know, look, I'm uh I'm pretty active on launch day trying to understand what's working. I'm looking for feedback. Um both, you know, an example, I'm on X trying to understand like see if people, average users how they're experiencing the product. I probably ping people back saying, look, you know, this is a valid point, we should address it. So, in some sense, I'm looking at that trying to assess it.
I'm not a student and I don't code. I am, however, on day 48 of my van tour through Europe with my wife and dog. We travel without a specific itinerary, chasing the wind and sun while working our 9 to 5 jobs. AI's mastery of travel planning has made it an unexpected but irreplaceable expert. So much so that we've grown increasingly dependent upon the free versions of Gemini and ChatGPT to help choose our next destination.
When you ask AI Mode a shopping question, you'll get an intelligently organized response that brings together rich visuals and all the details you need (like price, reviews and inventory info), helping you quickly and confidently decide what to buy. AI Mode responses are tailored to your specific question and formatted for your needs.
If you choose to go deep with Deep Research, you'll be able to add more sources as the report generates in the background. Google's blog says this will help "you assemble a rich knowledge base on any topic without leaving your workflow." The final report on the topic will include citations to relevant articles, websites, or papers, all of which you can pop into your notebook.
Conversational is much the same as writing a prompt to Google's Gemini or in the search engine's AI Mode: You can ask for recommendations for a product based on an individual's taste or needs, and you'll receive suggestions that relate as closely to the request as possible. During an event for showing off these shopping features, one example included searching in AI Mode for a skin moisturizer that's particularly helpful for the cold winter months.
Google is launching a new tool that uses AI to make it easier for Gmail users with Google Calendar to schedule their meetings. On Tuesday, the company launched a Gemini-powered "Help me schedule" feature that will surface ideal meeting times based on calendar availability and then display them to the person you're emailing to set up a meeting. The company notes that the feature is designed to work for one-on-one meetings, not those with multiple contacts or group meetings.
When we said Search will help you ask anything in whatever way is most natural to you, we meant it! As of today, AI Mode is rolling out to 36 new languages and more than 40 new countries and territories, bringing it to over 200 countries and territories total, including many across Europe.
Google has spent much of this year porting its Gemini chatbot to other platforms outside of Android. It arrived on Wear OS smartwatches this summer, it's coming to Android Auto this fall, but now it's Google Home's turn. Say goodbye to Google Assistant, which has powered many of Google's smart home products since its 2016 debut. The command word remains, "Hey Google," but now it'll activate Gemini. Nearly 10 years ago, Google Assistant was the company's answer to Amazon's Alexa. It kickstarted a voice assistant war, but after a period of stagnation, these chatbots have been revived with the advent of large language models.
Google might have found a way Gemini could be useful while you're playing games on your phone. The company is introducing a new software overlay today it calls the Play Games Sidekick that gives you access to Gemini Live while you play, alongside a host of other gaming-focused updates to Google Play that could make the app platform a better home for gamers.
Google is adding multiple new AI features to Chrome, the most popular browser in the world. The most visible change is a new button in Chrome that launches the Gemini chatbot, but there are also new tools for searching, researching, and answering questions with AI. Google has additional cursor-controlling "agentic" tools in the pipeline for Chrome as well.
AI Mode for search, which essentially allows Gemini to serve as the sifter of SERPs instead of the old-fashioned Google algorithm, became an opt-in preview feature in March before rolling out as an option to general Google users in May. For those who haven't deigned to use it, AI Mode basically turns the Google search page into a chat window where users can ask typical queries and get results delivered from a Gemini-powered chatbot that one has to assume isn't bullshitting them,
