{"id":239882,"date":"2026-01-18T17:22:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T17:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/239882\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T17:22:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T17:22:08","slug":"gmail-users-must-make-decisions-as-new-ai-tools-roll-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/239882\/","title":{"rendered":"Gmail users must make decisions as new AI tools roll out"},"content":{"rendered":"

This weekend Google began rolling out a suite of features powered by its Gemini 3<\/a> AI technology meant to automate the way people use Gmail.<\/p>\n

One of the biggest shifts will come with the introduction of AI Inbox, a tool that presents email summaries and an overview of a person\u2019s inbox instead of individual messages.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith email volume at an all-time high, managing your inbox and the flow of information has become as important as the emails themselves,\u201d Gmail VP of product Blake Barnes wrote in a blog post<\/a> announcing the changes.<\/p>\n

Google\u2019s goal, he said, is to turn Gmail into a \u201cpersonal, proactive inbox assistant.\u201d<\/p>\n

The company is currently testing the feature with a small subset of users, with a broader rollout planned for the coming months, Barnes wrote.<\/p>\n

Gmail will also soon allow users to change their primary email address, a long-requested option for those with embarrassing addresses from their younger years. <\/p>\n

But some of the new features will only be available to paying subscribers.<\/p>\n

AI Overview, which summarizes long email threads and highlights key points, is rolling out broadly, according to Fast Company.<\/p>\n

A more advanced tool, which allows users to ask Gmail questions when searching for an email and receive an AI-generated answer, will only be available to subscribers on Google One AI Pro or Ultra plans, priced at $20 and $250 per month, respectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cInstead of hunting for keywords or digging through a year of emails, just use natural language, like \u2018Who was the plumber that gave me a quote for the bathroom renovation last year?\u2019 Gemini\u2019s advanced reasoning pulls the answer, instantly summarizing the exact details you need,\u201d Barnes wrote.<\/p>\n

The company has stated that users will be able to opt out of the new features, a relief for those who have expressed concerns with the privacy and security of AI assisted email.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour inbox is filled with updates; some are critical, others are just noise,\u201d Barnes wrote. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe new AI Inbox filters out the clutter so you can focus on what\u2019s most important…Crucially, this analysis happens securely with the privacy protections you expect from Google, keeping your data under your control.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This weekend Google began rolling out a suite of features powered by its Gemini 3 AI technology meant…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":239883,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[365,74647,363,364,111,139,69,32488,145],"class_list":{"0":"post-239882","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-alabama-news","10":"tag-artificial-intelligence","11":"tag-artificialintelligence","12":"tag-new-zealand","13":"tag-newzealand","14":"tag-nz","15":"tag-tech-news","16":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239882"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239882\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}