Google rolled out two significant AI updates this week, expanding both its conversational search tool and its video creation platform. The company announced that AI Mode, its conversational search experience, now allows users to connect and interact with apps including Instacart, Canva, and YouTube directly within search. The update lets users complete tasks such as adding grocery items to an Instacart cart, generating design templates through Canva, or saving playlists to YouTube Music, all without leaving AI Mode. The rollout, currently available in the U.S., builds on similar app-connection capabilities Google introduced earlier this year in the Gemini app and positions Google to compete more directly with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude, both of which offer comparable integrations.
Separately, Google announced updates to Google Vids that introduce personalized AI avatars, allowing users to generate a digital version of themselves based on a selfie and voice recording. The update also brings Google’s multimodal model, Gemini Omni, to Vids, enabling users to generate videos from written prompts and reference images, adjust lighting or backgrounds, and make step-by-step edits without restarting a project. Google said avatars will be tied to a user’s Google account, watermarked with SynthID, and limited to users aged 18 and older in select regions.
Together, the updates reflect Google’s ongoing push to embed AI more deeply into everyday tools, extending AI Mode beyond search and repositioning Vids as a broader video creation platform.
