If you use Google apps like Gmail or Photos, Google already knows certain aspects of your life. The company is offering to make that knowledge more accessible via what it calls Personal Intelligence, which will synthesize that knowledge into Gemini.
Personal Intelligence will take information in Photos, YouTube, and Gmail and make them available to Gemini, provided that you have either a Google AI Pro or Google AI Ultra subscription within the United States. You’ll be able to access them via the web or Google’s mobile apps, and eventually more subscription tiers will be able to tap into it, even free subscribers.
In some sense, it’s a capitulation of sorts: Google already can mine your Gmail, for example, to pull out the most relevant mail and highlight it; or bury other communications in your spam folder. In a blog post, Google highlighted what else it might do: access a photo of your license plate that you snapped, or recommend new tires for your car based on a notification from the DMV. It’s opt-in, of course, but the argument continues to be: Why not, it’s so convenient!
Naturally, Google warns that it might make mistakes, or that it might not understand nuance.
“For instance, seeing hundreds of photos of you at a golf course might lead it to assume you love golf,” Google notes. “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, you can just tell it (‘I don’t like golf’).”
Google also says that it has guardrails to prevent it asking about personal topics, like your health, but it might not understand relationship changes, like a divorce.
To turn it on, go into the Gemini app, tap Settings, and then Personal Intelligence, then enable whatever apps you choose.
Should you use Google’s Personal Intelligence? This is one of those decisions that feels…personal.