At its annual Google I/O event on Tuesday, the company unveiled Pics, a new AI-powered app for design and image generation within Google Workspace. Google designed this tool to be accessible to a broad audience, ranging from educators to small business owners. With Pics, users can create social media graphics, invitations, marketing materials, and mock-ups using simple text prompts, eliminating the need for editing experience or advanced software.

By offering a straightforward way to produce visuals, Google is positioning itself against popular design platforms like Canva and AI-focused competitors such as Anthropic’s Claude Design. This move underscores that AI-driven design is rapidly becoming a key competitive field, with significant implications for any business reliant on visual content. The app is initially launching to a group of testers at I/O, with a broader rollout to Google AI Ultra subscribers planned for this summer.

Google acknowledges that while current AI models can generate high-quality images, modifying specific parts of an image remains challenging. If an image is nearly perfect but requires a small tweak, users often must start over with a new prompt, risking unwanted changes. To address this, Pics not only generates images but also makes them easily editable.

Users can enter a prompt, and Pics will produce the desired output. Gemini powers the editing layer, allowing every element in a generated design or image to be fully adjustable. You can modify elements by writing a new prompt, or simply click on the part you want to change and leave a comment—similar to providing feedback in Google Docs. Direct editing is also possible without comments or prompts. For instance, if you create a birthday party invitation and need to adjust the time displayed, you can do so manually.

Pics is powered by Nano Banana 2, which Google says is well-suited for the app due to its support for precise text rendering, real-world knowledge, and detailed visual output. The app is natively integrated into Google Workspace, enabling visual collaboration across its suite of tools. Once a design is finalized, users can download, copy, print, or share it, or pass it to someone else for final edits before publishing.

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