Google’s goal with Gemini is to make a “personal, proactive, and powerful” assistant. The Gemini app today is adding “Personal Intelligence” in beta. This lets Gemini use the data Google already has about you to “supercharge” and personalize responses.
Personal Intelligence can retrieve specific details from text, photos, or videos in your Google apps to customize Gemini responses. This includes:
- Google Workspace: Including Gmail, Calendar, Drive, etc.
- Google Photos
- YouTube: Watch history
- Search services: Including Search, Shopping, News, Maps, Google Flights and Hotels
Along with “reasoning across complex sources,” Gemini will “provide uniquely tailored answers.” This is a step beyond referencing past chats and something the company has been working towards since last year with the experimental “Personalization” model.
Google provides this example of Personal Intelligence, with personalization leveraged when Gemini thinks it will be helpful to the response:
- “…we needed new tires for our 2019 Honda minivan two weeks ago. Standing in line at the shop, I realized I didn’t know the tire size. I asked Gemini. These days any chatbot can find these tire specs, but Gemini went further. It suggested different options: one for daily driving and another for all-weather conditions, referencing our family road trips to Oklahoma found in Google Photos. It then neatly pulled ratings and prices for each.”
- “As I got to the counter, I needed our license plate. Instead of searching for it or losing my spot in line to walk back to the parking lot, I asked Gemini. It pulled the seven-digit number from a picture in Photos and also helped me identify the van’s specific trim by searching Gmail.”
Gemini will show its thinking process with an “Answer now” button that replaces the current “Skip.” The response will “reference or explain the information it used from your connected sources so you can verify it.”
You can correct Gemini about your preferences at any time, as well as regenerate responses without personalization enabled. There’s also the ability to use temporary chats.
On the privacy front, Personal Intelligence is off by default and you can choose specific apps to connect. Google explains how “Gemini doesn’t train directly on your Gmail inbox or Google Photos library.” Rather, it trains on “limited info, like specific prompts in Gemini and the model’s responses” to improve the capability.
In the minivan example, “photos of [the] road trip, the license plate picture in Photos and the emails in Gmail are not used to train the model.”
They are only referenced to deliver the reply. We train the model with things like my specific prompts and responses, only after taking steps to filter or obfuscate personal data from the conversation I have with Gemini. In short, we don’t train our systems to learn your license plate number; we train them to understand that when you ask for one, we can locate it.
The company says a “key differentiator” is how this sensitive data “already lives at Google securely” so it doesn’t need to be sent “elsewhere to start personalizing your experience.”
Google says Personal Intelligence also excels at recommending books, shows, clothes, and travel.
- “…it’s been exceptional for planning our upcoming spring break. By analyzing our family’s interests and past trips in Gmail and Photos, it skipped the tourist traps. Instead, it suggested an overnight train journey and specific board games we could play along the way.”
You can also tap the new “For you” chip on the homepage to see personalized prompt suggestions. Other example queries include:
- Recommend [local places i.e. hidden gems/restaurants/coffee shops/bakeries/etc.] I might enjoy in [city i.e. New York]?
- Help me plan my weekend in [city i.e. New York] based on things I like to do.
- Recommend [product i.e., backpacks, hiking boots, running watches] that I might like.
- Recommend some documentaries based on what I’ve been curious about.
- Suggest a few books I might enjoy based on my interests.
- What’s a totally different career where you could see me thriving?
- I want to treat myself to a fun surprise tomorrow. What should it be?
- I want to try a new non-time-intensive hobby. What should I get into?
- What’s a positive pattern that stands out in my life lately?
- Based on my delivery and grocery receipts in Gmail, Search history, and YouTube watch history, recommend 5 YouTube channels that match my cooking style or meal prep vibe.
Personal Intelligence beta advisories
As a guardrail, Google will “avoid making proactive assumptions about sensitive data like your health.” However, Gemini “will discuss this data with you if you ask.”
Personal Intelligence is available in beta and Google touts extensive testing to minimize mistakes. However, it still cautions about “inaccurate responses” or “over-personalization” wherein the “model makes connections between unrelated topics.” You can thumbs down these responses.
Specific “struggles” include timing and nuance “particularly regarding relationship changes, like divorces, or your various interests.”
For instance, seeing hundreds of photos of you at a golf course might lead it to assume you love golf. But it misses the nuance: you don’t love golf, but you love your son, and that’s why you’re there. If Gemini gets this wrong, just correct it (“I don’t like golf”).
How to get Gemini Personal Intelligence
Starting today, Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers with personal accounts (not Workspace) in the US will get the option to enable Personal Intelligence. Access is rolling out over the coming week. If you’re not prompted from the homepage:
- Open Gemini and tap your profile photo in the top-right corner for Settings
- Tap Personal Intelligence
- Select Connected Apps (Gmail, Photos, etc.)
It’s available on Android, iOS, and web with all Gemini 3 models today, including “Fast.”
In the future, it will come to the free tier and more countries, as well as AI Mode in Search “soon.”
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