Google Unveils Gemini Integration with Google Photos: A New Era of AI-Powered Image Search

Google details how Gemini is getting way smarter with its Google Photos integration

Google recently announced that Gemini would soon be able to tap into Google Photos, letting the AI chatbot answer natural language queries about your stored images. This would be possible through Gemini Extensions, which have recently been renamed to just "apps." While we are still waiting for the feature to roll out widely, Google has now shared more details on how Gemini's Google Photos integration will work. Through a new support document, Google is laying out how you can use Google Photos in conjunction with the Gemini app. You'll need apps for both Gemini and Google Photos installed on your device and have Gemini Apps Activity turned on, as that's the requirement for getting Apps in Gemini to work. Further, the feature is being gradually released to a select group of invited users in the US, so everyone won't have access. Currently, only English prompts are answered, though thankfully, both spoken and typed prompts work in the same way for Gemini's connected apps. As you'd expect, you need to connect Google Photos to Gemini Apps to begin with. Presuming you are eligible, you can use the tag "@Google Photos" to invoke the Google Photos app within Gemini. This would initialize the Gemini Apps connection and let you set it up for Google Photos integration. The Google Photos integration seemingly supercharges Gemini into being more useful, but there are still limitations. Google says you can't use the AI digital assistant to edit your photos, create collages or albums, or add labels to your photos in the Photos app. So, when the feature begins to roll out widely, it would be best used to retrieve information rather than manipulate data. From all the details that Google has shared about the integration, it does sound like the feature is pretty much a rename of the Ask Photos feature that the company announced at Google I/O. The feature would be an upgrade over the basic search functionality that Google Photos currently offers, so we hope Google will roll it out widely soon.

Here's How Gemini Integration in Google Photos App Lets Users Find Photos

It supports natural language queries and multi-step follow-up questions Nearly a year after unveiling its Ask Photos feature at the I/O developer conference in May 2024, Google has finally shed some light on how the feature will work. It was introduced as an extension for Google Photos which allows the on-device Gemini artificial intelligence (AI) assistant to access a user's images and answer queries about them. While the feature started shipping out in early access in September last year, the company has now confirmed the details about its availability and workings. According to a new support document published by Google, the feature is available on both Android and iOS platforms. It requires users to have Gemini and Google Photos apps installed, and have Gemini Apps Activity (formerly Gemini Extensions) enabled. Further, the Gemini app should have the same account logged in as the Photos app. Once done, the feature is ready for usage. The Mountain View-based tech giant says users can ask the Gemini app to find a photo in the Google Photos library. They can include @Google Photos or my photos in their prompt to ensure that Gemini uses the Google Photos app. It works with prompts such as: In essence, the Gemini integration in the Photos app lets users ask conversational queries to filter out a specific image stored on the user's cloud storage. They can ask detailed queries spanning multiple sentences or natural language prompts with some basic information about the image, enabling the AI to fetch the right image. They can also ask follow-up queries in case the AI is not able to find the image in the first attempt. Users can ask questions based on their face groups or relationships saved in the Photos app, the location or date the photo was taken, a description of what's in the photo, or their current conversation with the Gemini mobile app.