Google gives Gmail an AI overhaul as Gemini gains on ChatGPT
This could represent a huge shift in how the world’s biggest email provider works.
Google today announced what could be its biggest change yet to Gmail, the world’s largest email service. The company is adding an optional AI-powered inbox that prioritizes important messages, summarizes long threads, and lets users ask questions of their email the way they would Google’s Gemini chatbot — now built directly into Gmail.
The idea is to turn email into something closer to a living to-do list. By drawing on information from users’ emails and calendars, Gmail will suggest actions, draft responses, and surface what it thinks matters most.
Like many tech companies, Google has been putting AI into everything with the hopes of making its existing products more indispensable. Of course, companies like Apple have promised similar AI integration before and failed, so the features will actually have to work for them to be successful.
So far, Google’s AI efforts seem to be paying off. Traffic to Gemini’s website increased 28% in the last month, according to Similarweb, while ChatGPT’s shrunk nearly 6%, though on an absolute basis ChatGPT is still well ahead.
Google is giving access to the AI inbox first to “trusted testers” in the US and will make it available to consumers more broadly in the “coming months.”
