Gmail gets big Gemini update: 3 new AI features, including 'CliffsNotes' for your inbox
At Google I/O, the search-engine tech giant boasted that Gmail is poised to get new AI capabilities via Gemini. With Gemini underpinning Gmail, a new field will appear, allowing you to ask the AI chatbot to summarize certain emails in your inbox.
Summarization isn't the only thing rolling out to Gmail. Here are three features Google has announced for its popular inbox app.
1. Gmail can summarize your emails for you
As mentioned, Google is sprinkling some more Gemini magic into Gmail. Here's an example Google provided to illustrate Gmail's new capabilities: Imagine you have a child in elementary school. Perhaps you have a number of emails from said school, but you still need to catch up. Instead of wasting time and parsing through those emails, you can now use Gemini as a "CliffsNotes" tool, allowing you to summarize those emails.
If you use a prompt like, "Catch me up on emails from Maywood Park Elementary School," Gemini will give you a rundown of everything you missed — and you don't need to open a single email.
2. Get Google Meet highlights
Let's say you miss an hour-long Google Meet, and you don't have the time to sit through the entire recording that was sent to your email.
Using the panel on the right, you can ask Gemini to tell you the main points of the meeting, allowing you to get up to speed with your team.
3. Ask Gemini questions about information in your emails
While showcasing Gemini's capabilities on mobile devices, Google boasted that the AI model can find information for you, even if it's buried deep inside your inbox.
For example, in the Google I/O presentation, a demo showed a woman asking, "When are my shoes arriving?" and "What times do the doors open for the Knicks game?" You don't need to scramble to find the right emails that give you the answers to these questions. Instead, Gemini will sift through your emails and hand you the answers without much effort on your part.
Google says that the summarization features are rolling out this month, while the Q&A capabilities will be available in July.
Topics Google
Kimberly Gedeon, at Mashable since 2023, is a tech explorer who enjoys doing deep dives into the most popular gadgets, from the latest iPhones to the most immersive VR headsets. She's drawn to strange, avant-garde, bizarre tech, whether it's a 3D laptop, a gaming rig that can transform into a briefcase, or smart glasses that can capture video. Her journalism career kicked off about a decade ago at MadameNoire where she covered tech and business before landing as a tech editor at Laptop Mag in 2020.
