Google is continuing to weave artificial intelligence deeper into your email. At its IO 2026 developer conference on Tuesday, the company revealed an expansion of Gmail’s “AI Inbox” tools, now adding conversational AI capabilities. This means you can simply ask Gmail about the contents of your inbox instead of typing specific keywords into the search bar. The feature, powered by Gemini and called Gmail Live, is designed to help you quickly locate information buried within your emails.

For instance, you might need details about an upcoming flight, the time of your dentist appointment, the door code for your Airbnb, or specifics about a school event. Previously, you would have to type keywords, an email address, or a domain into the search box to narrow things down. That approach doesn’t always make emails easy to find, especially when the search term appears across many different messages. “Gmail Live can answer naturally phrased questions, respond to follow-up questions, and pivot if you need to interrupt it,” said Devanshi Bhandari, product lead for Gmail, during a briefing ahead of Google I/O, where the feature was first introduced to the public. This is another example of how Google is demonstrating that its AI technology can deliver practical improvements to products used by millions, at a time when many outside the tech industry are questioning the value of AI—especially as new data centers are built nearby, driving up electricity costs. By making it simpler to find something lost in your inbox—a frustration nearly everyone has experienced—Google hopes to present a clear, positive use case for AI. Bhandari showed Gmail Live to reporters, asking it a series of questions about emails in the inbox, such as a child’s show-and-tell project, a class field trip, and hotel and flight details for a trip to Detroit. Much like using a standalone AI chatbot such as Gemini or ChatGPT, Gmail users can ask these questions aloud in natural language, and the chatbot responds. During the demo, Bhandari noted that Gmail Live understood subtle differences between terms like “field trip” and “trip,” and could smoothly shift from one topic to another. The AI can also extract specific details from emails, such as a hotel room number, or infer which people you’re asking about even if they aren’t explicitly named. Similar voice technology is also coming to the to-do list app Google Keep, the company mentioned.

Importantly, Gmail Live does not replace traditional Gmail search—it simply offers another option. Google may have learned from past experience that not everyone wants a fully AI-driven interface; after upgrading Google Photos with AI-powered search, the company faced significant backlash and later made the feature optional. Gmail is also gaining other new capabilities, including ready-to-send drafts, instant file access, and the ability to manage tasks by marking individual items as done.

Additionally, the AI Inbox experience, which launched earlier this year, will expand beyond Google AI Ultra subscribers to include Google AI Pro and Plus subscribers. This feature provides an overview of tasks and items that need attention, all on one page. However, the voice-powered Gmail Live feature will roll out later this summer and will initially be limited to Google AI Ultra subscribers.

Catch up on the rest of Google IO 2026’s big news Google Search as you know it is over Google updates Gemini app to take on ChatGPT and Claude Google introduces Gemini Spark, a 24/7 agent assistant with Gmail integration How to use Google’s new information agents