Google to Let Users Disable Visible Watermarks on AI-Generated Content

Google announced it will allow users to remove visible watermarks from AI-generated images, videos, and songs, while keeping invisible tracking methods intact. Josh Woodward, Google’s VP for Gemini, said the new toggle will apply to the company’s Nano Banana, Omni, and Lyria models, with the setting initially available in Gemini and Google’s video editing tool, Flow, and support for Search expected soon.

Woodward said the change won’t affect Google’s invisible SynthID watermark or C2PA metadata standards, both of which will continue tracking AI-generated content for transparency purposes. He described the update as an effort to balance creative flexibility with continued safety measures, noting that tools like Gemini and Search will still be able to identify AI-generated media even without a visible marker. The feature will roll out in the coming days, allowing users to adjust the setting through Settings > Media Watermark.

Alongside the update, Google is open-sourcing a new library called Credentio, designed to help developers build local validation tools for verifying C2PA content credentials within their own applications.

The announcement follows a separate and more contentious decision by Anthropic to introduce watermarking for text and files generated by its Claude models, a move made to comply with European Union transparency regulations.