Google launches Gemini with Personalization, beating Apple to personal AI

Google

Google Gemini has introduced a conversational AI assistant to understand users' needs conversationally. But what if, in addition to understanding what you say, it could also understand you from your everyday interactions with your device? Now it can.

Also: AI agents aren't just assistants: How they're changing the future of work today

On Thursday, Google unveiled Gemini with Personalization, an experimental, opt-in experience that allows users to connect Gemini to their Search history to better inform the assistant's responses. In the coming months, users will also be able to connect to Google Photos and YouTube.

How it works

Gemini with Personalization, powered by an experimental Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking model, needs to be manually turned on by interested users to connect to their Search history. Specifically, users must go to Gemini Apps and select the "Personalization (experimental)" model from the drop-down menu.

Also: Google claims Gemma 3 reaches 98% of DeepSeek's accuracy – using only one GPU

Once activated, Gemini will analyze Search history before generating a response to see if it can add context to the answer. The Search history will only be used if Google's advanced models determine that it can enhance the response. Since this is experimental, Google says it will continue to gather user feedback to make it as useful as possible.

Privacy concerns

Clearly, having an AI model examine your Search history will raise some privacy concerns. To address these apprehensions, Google reassures users that they are in control and can easily disconnect Gemini from their Search history at any time.

Also: Even premium AI tools distort the news and fabricate links – these are the worst

Moreover, when using the experiment, Gemini will display a clear banner with a link that lets you easily unlink your Search history. Because it is accessing your Search history, you can also edit your history as you regularly would, adding another layer of control.

Google

The company also says there will be clear notice before linking Gemini to your Search history, asking for permission before connecting to apps or your Search history, with a pop-up message seen below. Gemini will also show a full outline of the data sources it used in its response, including whether it informed its answer from your past chats or your Search history.

Google

Who can access

Gemini with Personalization is available as an experimental feature to Gemini and Gemini Advanced subscribers on the web starting today, with a gradual rollout planned for mobile. The feature is unavailable to users under 18, Google Workspace, and Education users.

Also: Can AI supercharge creativity without stealing from artists?

This update is significant because, when it has access to apps, Gemini can act as more of a personal assistant that is seamlessly connected to your everyday workflow. Apple wanted to achieve something similar with Apple Intelligence, which, in its full form, is meant to be a "personal intelligence" system grounded in your personal information and context from apps and your screen.

However, Apple Intelligence is nowhere near a personal assistant. Its features are limited to Genmoji, Image Playground, notification summaries, writing tools, voicemail transcriptions, Visual Intelligence, and ChatGPT integration. The company also recently confirmed that the highly anticipated Siri upgrades will take longer than expected to be delivered to the public.

Also: Goodbye Gemini, hello Pixel Sense? What we know about Google's AI assistant for Pixel 10

Along with the launch of the Personalization feature, Google also announced a slew of other features for Gemini, including expanded access to Deep Research and Gems.