AI Mode pop-up asks searchers to link Gmail and Photos to Search

Personal Intelligence is the AI Mode feature that tailors answers from your past searches and the activity saved in your history. Google’s help page says connecting content apps starts with Google Photos and the Workspace apps Gmail and Calendar, and that users can connect or disconnect them at any time. AI Mode personalisation itself needs users to be 18 or older with history and personalised recommendations turned on.

The same page spells out how far that consent reaches. Once given, Workspace and Photos become available to every Search service, which Google lists as Shopping, Maps, Translate, News, Hotels and Flights alongside Search itself, AI Mode and Discover. A separate memory feature, where AI Mode keeps details you tell it to remember, runs in the US in English.

Google also notes that it is updating the settings for its Search services, so the page may not match what every user sees.

The help page names no paid plan among its conditions. On our price sheet, Google AI Pro costs $19.99 a month and Gemini’s Free plan $0, our 8 November check.

The pop-up sells better AI Mode answers, yet by Google’s own note the consent behind it also opens a searcher’s Gmail and Photos to Shopping, Maps and Discover.