The company is expanding AI features across its platforms, with YouTube set to introduce a new search experience called Ask YouTube.

The tool will allow users to ask more complex questions and refine their searches through follow-ups. Again, it will combine Shorts and long-form videos, as well as surface specific parts of clips that match what people are looking for.

“With Ask YouTube, you can ask more complex search queries, such as wanting tips on how to teach your kid to ride a bike, or finding creator reviews of cosy games to play before bedtime,” the company explained. “You can even ask follow-up questions to continue refining what you’re looking for.”

The feature is currently being tested with YouTube Premium users in the United States on desktop, with a wider rollout planned for later this year.

YouTube also announced a new video creation feature linked to Gemini models, including Gemini Omni. The company said the system will be used in Shorts Remix and the YouTube Create app to help users generate and edit video content with more control over output.

“Remixing with Omni delivers a fresh way for users to create and build on each other’s imagination,” YouTube wrote in a press release. “The model better understands user intent creating more consistent and meaningful storytelling while also handling complex video and audio adjustments behind the scenes.”

Alongside this, YouTube is expanding its likeness detection system for creators aged 18 and above. The tool is designed to help identify when a creator’s face is used in AI-generated content without permission. Creators can request takedowns where misuse is detected.

Separately, Google chief executive Sundar Pichai used his keynote at I/O to outline the company’s progress and the scale of its AI systems.

“It’s been an extraordinary year since our last I/O, a period of relentless shipping, technology advances and hyper progress,” he said. “We’re now in the part of the AI cycle where people want to see the value in the products they use every day.”

He said Google is still focused on building across its hardware, research and product stack, with AI now central to Search, Android, cloud services and developer tools.

He also pointed to rapid growth in usage across Google systems, with the company now processing far more data through its models than in previous years. Usage is also surging across consumer and enterprise tools.

Search is the company’s largest distribution point for its AI features. AI Overviews now has more than 2.5 billion monthly users. AI Mode has also passed 1 billion monthly users.

The Gemini app has grown as well, now having more than 900 million monthly users, up from 400 million the previous year. Google said usage frequency has increased significantly as new features are added.

The company also highlighted adoption by developers and cloud customers. Millions of developers now build with its models, while enterprise usage continues to scale across industries.

Pichai said the company is seeing strong engagement with generative tools for study, work and creative tasks, including image and video generation.

On infrastructure, Google is expanding investment in custom chips known as TPUs to support growing demand. It also outlined newer generations of its hardware designed for both training and inference workloads.

These systems are aimed at improving speed, efficiency and scale across its services, particularly Search and Gemini.

Google also introduced Gemini 3.5 Flash at the I/O conference, a faster and more cost-efficient model designed for broad use across products and developer tools. The company said it improves performance across coding and real-world tasks while reducing operating costs for large-scale usage.

In internal testing, the model is already being used in developer systems to speed up work on new tools and services. Google is also expanding its agent-focused platform, Antigravity, which allows users to manage autonomous AI agents that can carry out tasks over time.

A new version, Antigravity 2.0, is being released as a desktop application for developers and enterprises.

Google also introduced Gemini Spark, a personal agent designed to work across apps and services on behalf of users. It can run tasks in the background and update users on progress.

Spark will integrate with Google products and third-party tools. It will first roll out to trusted testers before expanding to subscribers in the United States.

On the consumer side, Google said it is moving Search towards more interactive and task-based experiences. New features will allow users to set up agents that monitor information and deliver updates automatically.

The company also announced new tools for content creation, at the I/O conference, including Google Flow for planning and editing complex projects, and Google Pics for image generation and editing using its Nano Banana model.

It shared progress on wearable devices, such as audio glasses that can deliver spoken assistance and upcoming display glasses that show information in real time.

Google is also expanding tools for science and research, linking its Gemini systems with external databases to support scientific work and experimentation.

The company said the updates are aiming for systems that can handle tasks, not just respond to queries, as it expands its products across consumer, developer and enterprise markets.

With this rollout, subscribers in regions including Europe, India, and Indonesia can now create short videos using just text prompts. 

However, users are limited to three videos per day. After that, they’re pushed back to Veo 2, an older version with fewer features and no native audio.

This shows Google’s continued focus on product differentiation between its AI subscription tiers. Initially reserved for AI Ultra subscribers at $249.99/month, Veo 3 was quietly made available to AI Pro users (who pay $19.99/month) last month, albeit with access to the slightly slower “Veo 3 Fast” version.

Compared to Veo 2, the upgrades in Veo 3 are commendable. The tool now generates videos with built-in audio, including dialogue, ambient sounds, and even nature effects, giving creators more realistic, complete video outputs without needing post-production.

Josh Woodward, a lead product executive at Google, confirmed on Wednesday: “India, Indonesia, all of Europe, and more are starting to get access to create videos right now.”

Beyond audio, the model also introduces smoother motion, improved character consistency across frames, and more accurate lighting and physics, raising the bar for realism in short video generation. 

These enhancements address long-standing complaints about previous models’ choppy animations and visual glitches.

Google also claims users will face fewer interruptions when creating content, citing reduced content blocking. However, no specifics were given about how moderation thresholds have changed, a likely sensitive area as synthetic video tools come under checks globally.

Importantly, every video generated with Veo 3 is tagged with SynthID watermarks, both visible and invisible, to maintain traceability and discourage misuse. This is beyond protecting the tool’s integrity, but defending Google’s reputation as it wades deeper into generative content.

A later update will allow Google users to upload static images and animate them using Veo 3’s engine, an image-to-video feature already offered by some competitors like Runway and Pika. Unlike OpenAI’s Sora, which remains in limited preview, Google Veo 3 is publicly accessible to all paying users.

Veo 3’s most captivating use cases range from marketing visuals to concept design. According to Google, it’s aimed at creators “who want to break through creative blocks and visualise ideas in a flash.”

That may be true, but for now, they’ll have to visualise in under eight seconds.

“Today, Gemini 2.5 Pro sweeps the LMArena leaderboard in all categories,” he said. “Model progress is enabled by our world-leading infrastructure. Our seventh-generation TPU, Ironwood, is the first designed specifically to power thinking and inferential AI workloads at scale. It delivers 10 times the performance over the previous generation, and packs an incredible 42.5 exaflops compute per pod — just amazing.”

From Pichai’s keynote, it is obvious Google continues to shove more generative AI features into its core products. Its AI Mode, which is what the company is calling a new chatbot, will soon be live in Search for all US users.

AI Mode is in a separate tab and it’s designed to handle more complex queries than people have historically used Search for. 

You might use it to compare different fitness trackers or find the most affordable tickets for an upcoming event. AI Mode will soon be able to whip up custom charts and graphics related to your specific queries too. It can also handle follow-up questions.

The chatbot now runs on Gemini 2.5. Google plans to bring some of its features into the core Search experience by injecting them into AI Overviews. Labs users will be the first to get access to the new features before Google rolls them out more broadly.

Meanwhile, AI Mode is powering some new shopping features. You’ll soon be able to upload a single picture of yourself to see what a piece of clothing looks like on a virtual version of you.

Also, similar to the way in which Google Flights keeps an eye out for price drops, Google will be able to let you know when an item you want (in its specific size and color) is on sale for a price you’re willing to pay. 

It can even complete the purchase on your behalf if you want.

1.5 billion people see AI Overviews each month

Google told us that AI Overviews, the Gemini-powered summaries that appear at the top of search results and has had plenty of problems, are seen by more than 1.5 billion folks every month. 

The “overwhelming majority” of people interact with these in a meaningful way, the company said — this could mean clicking on something in an overview or keeping it on their screen for a while (presumably to read through it).

At Google I/O 2025, the CEO boasted that Gemini 2.5 is here with improved functionality, upgraded security and transparency, extra control and better cost efficiency. 

Gemini 2.5 Pro is bolstered by a new enhanced reasoning mode called Deep Think. The model can do things like turn a grid of photos into a 3D sphere of pictures, and then add narration for each image. Gemini 2.5’s text-to-speech feature can also change up languages on the fly. 

There’s much more to it than that, of course, and we’ve got more details in our Gemini 2.5 story.

…Key announcements at Google I/O 2025 check HERE