Listen to your documents using Gemini in Google Docs

What’s changing 

For those who prefer to listen to document content, we’re excited to introduce the ability to create audio versions of your documents using Gemini in Google Docs. 

Whether you want to hear your content out loud, absorb information better while reading, or help catch errors in your writing, audio versions of your documents provide you with clear, natural-sounding voices that read your documents aloud. You also have the option to customize your audio experience with a variety of voices and playback speeds to match your personal preferences. 

This new feature includes capabilities for both authors and readers to listen to documents. More specifically:

Readers can access the Listen to this tab option, available in the Tools > Audio menu, to quickly listen to the contents of the current tab. 


Authors can add Audio buttons, available in the Insert > Audio buttons menu, which inserts a play button directly into documents so readers can easily listen to the current tab with a single click. Once added to the document, authors can change the label, color, and size of the button. 


Who’s impacted 

End users 

Why you’d use it 


This new audio feature in Docs helps you engage with your content in fresh ways and can improve accessibility of your documents. Additional details This feature is only available in English and on desktop at this time. 

Getting started 


Rollout pace 


Availability 

Available to Google Workspace: 
  • Business Standard and Plus 
  • Enterprise Standard and Plus 
  • Customers with the Gemini Education or Gemini Education Premium add-on 
  • Customers with the Gemini Business or Gemini Enterprise add-on* 
  • Google AI Pro and Ultra 
*As of January 15, 2025, we’re no longer offering the Gemini Business and Gemini Enterprise add-ons for sale. Please refer to this announcement for more details. 

Resources 

Improving the ISEMAIL and ISURL functions in Google Sheets

What’s changing 

=ISURL() and =ISEMAIL() are two Google Sheets functions that check whether a value is a valid URL or email address, respectively. To ensure more domains and email addresses are properly recognized by these functions, we’re improving the way they are evaluated. Moving forward, properly formatted email addresses and URLs will more accurately return TRUE when passed through =ISEMAIL() or =ISURL(). 

Additional details 

This change, once fully rolled out, will impact both new uses of these functions as well as existing uses of these functions. 

Getting started 

  • Admins: 
    • There is no admin control for this feature. 
  • End users: 
    • There is no end user setting for this feature. Visit the Help Center to learn more about =ISURL() and =ISEMAIL(). 

Rollout pace 


Availability 

  • Available to all Google Workspace customers, Workspace Individual Subscribers, and users with personal Google accounts 

Resources 


Catch up on unread messages within a conversation in Google Chat

What’s changing 

You can currently use Gemini in Google Chat to summarize unread conversations in the Chat home view and to summarize files shared in conversations. To build upon this, we’re adding the ability to catch up on unread messages in a direct message, group conversation, or space. 

With this launch, when opening a space or group direct message with a significant number of unread messages, you’ll see a card in the conversation pane summarizing recent discussions. When there are a smaller number of unread messages, you can l manually generate a summary by clicking / tapping on the summarize button. 

This new feature will help you more easily catch up on unread messages within conversations so you can quickly get up to speed and respond as needed. 

Initially, this will be available for users on the web. The feature will launch on mobile at a later date. 

Requesting a conversation summary on web 

Who’s impacted 

  • End users 

Getting started 

  • Admins: 
  • End users: 
    • On web, open an unread conversation and click the conversation summary button. If a conversation summary is not proactively shown, click on the summarize button from the unread line to request it manually. 
    • On mobile, open an unread conversation and tap the conversation summary button. If a conversation summary is not proactively shown, tap on the summarize button from the unread line to request it manually. 
    • Users can control whether summaries are proactively shown by toggling the Summaries in conversation setting within Chat settings > Message & Media > Message Features. 
    • Visit the Help Center to learn more about summarizing conversations in Google Chat. 

Rollout pace 


Availability 

Available for Google Workspace: 
  • Business Standard and Plus 
  • Enterprise Standard and Plus 
  • Frontline Plus 
  • Customers with the Gemini Education or Gemini Education Premium add-on 
Anyone who previously purchased these add-ons will also receive this feature: 
  • Gemini Business* 
  • Gemini Enterprise* 
  • AI Meetings and Messages* 

*As of January 15, 2025, we’re no longer offering the Gemini Business and Gemini Enterprise add-ons for sale. Please refer to this announcement for more details. 

Resources 

Coming soon: A refreshed user interface for Google Meet hardware touch controllers, test it now in preview

What’s changing 

In the coming weeks, we will be introducing an updated user interface for the Mimo Vue HD, Mimo Mist, Logitech Tap, Logitech Tap IP and Lenovo Series One Touch controllers.

To explore this upcoming feature, we encourage Admins to change the feature preview setting to enable Early preview for their devices. This will give admins time to prepare for the change, and end users to become familiar with the new design. See the “Additional details” section below for more information. 

Overall, the design allows users to concentrate on their meetings rather than searching for controls, resulting in a more efficient and aesthetically pleasing experience. Here’s what you can expect: 
  • Simplified Access to Key Controls: the controls you use most frequently, like mute and hand raise, are more prominent and easily accessible, helping you cut down on time searching for features and more time focusing on your meeting. 
  • Intuitively Organized Features: 
    • In-meeting experience: If you need to access more advanced features, like camera controls or the meeting layout, you can find them under the “More actions” menu. This keeps the main interface clean while ensuring less frequently used features are still readily accessible. 
    • Pre-call experience: You’ll also notice a refresh for the pre-call meeting UI, which prominently features the option to enter a meeting code or nickname, and a drop-down menu for Webex or Zoom meetings. 
  • A Familiar Interface: The touch controller UI will now look and feel similar to the Google Meet UI as seen on Laptop & Desktop devices, which will help navigating the menu more intuitively. 
Touch Controller UI Refresh pre-meeting experience


Touch Controller UI Refresh Annotated pre-meeting Experience


Touch Controller UI Refresh In-meeting Experience


Touch Controller UI Refresh Annotated In-meeting Experience


Touch Controller Advanced View


UI refresh pre-meeting experience


We’ll share more information about when the refreshed user interface will become generally available soon. 

Additional details 

More information about Early Preview Rooms 
We highly recommend joining our Early Preview Rooms (EPR), beginning August 18th, 2025, to help your organization get ready for this change. 

Enrolling devices into EPR allows you to: 
  • Test: Experience the new UI firsthand on select devices in your environment 
  • Prepare: Use the preview period (approximately 4-6 weeks) to update your internal training documents, support resources, and end-user communications 
  • Provide feedback: Share your feedback to help us refine the experience before general availability 

How to participate: 

Expanding availability 
We plan to expand support for the new UI to all Google Meet touch controllers, including AOSP devices. We’ll share more information here on the Workspace Updates blog once available. 

Getting started


Rollout pace 

  • Available for Early Preview Rooms starting on starting on August 18th, 2025 

Availability 

  • Available to all Google Workspace customers with Google Meet hardware devices 

Resources 

Increased credit limit for Google AI Ultra for Business users and expanded country availability to Whisk

What’s changing 

Google AI Ultra for Business is an add-on for Google Workspace that provides the highest access to AI features and models, and includes next-generation AI tools. With this launch, we are increasing the credit limit to use with Whisk and Flow for Google AI Ultra for Business users from 12,500 per user per month to 25,000 per user per month. This means you'll be able to generate twice as many clips and scenes as you build your story in Flow or animations in Whisk. 

Additionally, we’re excited to announce that starting August 19, 2025 we’re expanding availability of Whisk, our experiment that allows you to create images using both text and image prompts, to 77 additional countries. 

Getting started 

  • Admins: 
  • End users: 
    • No action needed. All users with a Google AI Ultra for Business license will see their monthly AI credits limit increase to 25,000. Use our Help Center to learn more about how AI credits in Google AI Ultra for Business work. 
    • Whisk is optimized for English, but supports a number of additional languages. See the Labs FAQ for more detail. 

Rollout pace 


Availability 

Available for Google Workspace customers with these add-ons: 
  • Google AI Ultra for Business 

Resources 

Announcing Imagen 4 Fast and the generally availability of the Imagen 4 family in the Gemini API

Google announces the general availability of Imagen 4, its advanced text-to-image model, in the Gemini API and Google AI Studio, featuring significant improvements in text rendering. The new Imagen 4 Fast model, designed for speed and rapid image generation, is now available alongside Imagen 4 and Imagen 4 Ultra, with Imagen 4 and Imagen 4 Ultra also supporting up to 2K resolution image generation.