Google’s AI Search Leap Forward

If you pay attention to one thing in AI this week, it should be Google’s I/O presentation on Tuesday. The tech giant unveiled a bunch of AI tools, most significantly the addition of new AI features such as agents to Google Search. Any distinction that existed between Google’s Gemini AI chatbot and its search bar is disappearing.

No longer should we compare OpenAI’s ChatGPT to Gemini—it’s ChatGPT versus Google Search. That’s a big deal, given that Search is much more widely used than Gemini—Google CEO Sundar Pichai intimated today that Search has 3 billion monthly users, while the Gemini chatbot had 900 million. (ChatGPT is bigger than Gemini, at least: Its user number has been hovering at a little over 900 million weekly active users for a while now.)