For more than 20 years Google has been investing in machine learning research and tools that make daily life easier. In May 2026 the company rolled out a wave of updates that push AI to be more proactive, creative and present in devices and services you already use.
What mattered most in May 2026
- Launch of
Gemini 3.5andGemini Omni: models for agents and multimodal generation from video to text. - New agent capabilities in Search and the Gemini app: agents that run in the background and execute complex flows.
- AI-optimized hardware: Googlebook and Android updates designed for Gemini.
- Health and wellness: new Google Health app and the Fitbit Air wearable.
- Tools for creators and science: partnerships with Flow Music, Project Genie with Street View, Gemini for Science and the REPLIQA initiative in life sciences and quantum computing.
- Transparency and content verification to identify AI-generated material.
Gemini Omni and creating from any input
Can you imagine asking a model to create a video from a photo, an audio clip and a piece of text? That’s what Gemini Omni proposes. It’s a model designed to combine images, audio, video and text as inputs and generate coherent, high-quality content while leveraging real-world knowledge.
Why does this matter to you? Because multimodal generation enables uses that used to be fragmented: from making personalized tutorials to producing audiovisual content without an expensive studio. It’s not magic — it’s AI combining different data sources to understand context and deliver aligned results.
Agents that do the work for you: Gemini 3.5 and the proactive app
Gemini 3.5 is the version focused on frontier intelligence to take actions. That means, beyond answering questions, it can perform complex, chained tasks: book appointments, organize emails or build workflows across apps.
The Gemini app now thinks in active mode. With a new interface, daily summaries and Gemini Spark, it acts in the background: manages your inbox, suggests meetings and anticipates what you might need. Sounds like a continuous personal assistant. Does that make you a little uneasy? That’s normal, but it can also save you hours of repetitive work.
Search, coding and information agents
Search gets one of its biggest updates in 25 years. Google integrates information agents into Search that monitor topics for you and send updates with links and tools to act. It also brings agentic coding capabilities like Antigravity and Gemini 3.5 Flash inside results, letting you build generative interfaces, dashboards or small apps directly from search.
Practical example: you ask Search to create a personalized fitness tracker and within minutes you’ll have a prototype using real-time data like reviews, maps and weather. You don’t need to be a developer to get a functional experience.
Android Halo, Universal Cart and cross-device experiences
To manage agents there’s Android Halo, a space on your phone to see agent progress and get contextual help without interrupting what you’re doing.
Universal Cart simplifies shopping: it’s a cart that works across Search, Gemini, YouTube and Gmail, gathering products from different stores in one place. Fewer open tabs, more coherent shopping.
Hardware: Googlebook, Fitbit Air and smart eyewear
Googlebook is a new family of laptops designed from the ground up for the Gemini era. It includes the Magic Pointer for contextual suggestions, customizable widgets and tighter Android integration. Partners like Acer, Asus, Dell, HP and Lenovo will manufacture the devices.
Fitbit Air arrives as the brand’s smallest tracker, with high-fidelity sensors offering 24/7 heart rate monitoring, atrial fibrillation alerts, SpO2 and sleep analysis. The idea is a discreet but powerful wellness companion.
Smart eyewear was also announced to get directions, send texts and take photos without pulling out your phone. All of this nudges everyday experience toward smoother interaction with AI.
Tools for creators and realistic environments
Google Flow Music and distributor Believe are partnering to bring AI into the music creative process: from lyric ideas to polishing the final mix. It’s not about replacing human talent, but expanding creative options.
Project Genie combined with Street View lets you simulate and explore realistic 3D environments from your browser. Think planning a trip or designing remote training inside an interactive reproduction of a real place.
Science, climate and quantum computing
Google introduced Gemini for Science, a toolkit to scale and sharpen scientific research. AlphaEvolve shows real applications in logistics, chip design and molecular simulations.
The REPLIQA initiative provides $10 million to five universities to apply advanced quantum science and AI to life sciences. DeepMind also launched an accelerator in the Asia Pacific for startups using frontier AI in climate, energy and the environment. See the pattern? AI as a tool to tackle complex problems beyond the lab.
Transparency and verification
With the rise of AI-generated content, Google expands transparency and verification tools across Search, Gemini, Chrome, Pixel and Cloud. The goal is for you to understand whether content was created or edited with AI and have clear signals to assess its reliability.
Final reflection
May 2026 underscores a trend: AI stops being just an answer engine and starts to act, create and propose solutions in the background. That brings huge opportunities for productivity, creativity and science, but it also forces us to ask about privacy, control and responsibility.
Do you want AI to handle routine tasks or would you rather keep manual control? That’s a personal choice, but the interesting part is you now have more options to try and decide.
Original source
https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/technology/ai/google-ai-updates-may-2026