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AI will soon be in your inbox as Gmail begins to roll out the new Gemini side panel feature which aims to speed up email drafting and organization.
The search giant announced the upcoming change in a Google Workspace Updates blog post, saying “We’re excited to introduce the general availability of Gemini in the Gmail side panel.”
This news comes at the same time as the announcement of the other products to be given the feature, including Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Slides, and Google Drive.
The use of Gemini in Gmail will provide suggested responses to emails, help with drafting messages, and allow users to summarize and ask questions to find specific information from the inbox or Google Drive files.
The technology will have proactive prompts, but freeform questions can be asked by users too. This could include asking Gemini to search ‘How much did the company spend on the last marketing event?’ or ‘When is the next team meeting?’
Gmail’s Gemini AI tool reserved for paying customers only
While the feature sounds useful for anyone with a cluttered inbox, the roll out will only be available to people with Google One AI Premium, or the Business, Enterprise, or Education add-on from Gemini.
The eligible accounts will be able to access the chatbot at the side panel of Workspace apps, but they must turn on smart features and the personalization setting for this to be visible.
An ‘Ask Gemini’ button will be visible at the top right-hand corner of the web version of the email site. While the mobile version can be accessed by tapping on the ‘summarize this email’ chip in an email thread.
Users who have the ‘rapid release’ setting turned on will be amongst the first to see the feature as this started to be rolled out on Monday (June 24). A gradual rollout will then take place for those on the default setting and this will begin on July 8.
Featured Image: Via Google Workspace Updates
