Gemini

Gemini is Google's AI assistant and the name of its family of AI models. The Gemini app helps people write, plan, learn, research, code, and create images and video, and Gemini models power AI features across Google's products, including Search, Workspace and Android. Its biggest advantage is integration with Google's ecosystem. Gemini can work with information in Gmail, Google Docs, Drive, Calendar, Maps and YouTube, so it can summarise emails, draft documents from files, plan trips with real places or answer questions about a video, with permission from the user. On Android phones it serves as an assistant that can understand what is on screen and take actions, and Gemini Live supports natural voice conversations, including camera and screen sharing so the assistant can see what the user sees. The models are built to be multimodal, handling text, images, audio, video and code, and they support long context, which lets Gemini analyse long documents, large codebases or lengthy videos. Features such as Deep Research produce detailed reports from many web sources, Gems let users create custom assistants for repeated tasks, and NotebookLM, a related Google product, turns uploaded sources into summaries and audio overviews. Image and video generation use Google's generative media models. Gemini is free to use with limits, and Google's AI subscription plans provide access to more capable models, higher limits, more storage and Gemini inside Workspace apps. Businesses access Gemini through Google Workspace and Google Cloud, and developers through the Gemini API and Vertex AI. The trade-offs are familiar for AI assistants: answers can be wrong and need checking, and connecting personal data raises privacy considerations that users should review. Its value is greatest for people already using Google services heavily. Alternatives include ChatGPT, the most widely used assistant; Claude from Anthropic for writing and long documents; Microsoft Copilot for Microsoft 365; Perplexity for cited search answers; Apple Intelligence on Apple devices; and Meta AI. Choose Gemini when you live in Google's apps and want an assistant that works across them.