NotebookLM: Google’s AI-Powered Note-Taking App Now Available to All US Users

NotebookLM, a note-taking app infused with a large language model, is now available. The company created it to only extract information from a custom dataset. This means you can use it to help write a paper based on specific PDFs and only rely on details from those documents. It ensures that NotebookLM will always handle relevant information to your specific needs rather than a more general chatbot that draws from the entire public internet. Google unveiled this technology at I/O this year and says it’s based on its AI. Personal data isn’t used to train NotebookLM, so any sensitive or private details in your sources will remain hidden, unless you share the sources with collaborators. In addition to making NotebookLM more widely available, Google has announced new features for the software that aim to make the transition between reading, taking notes, and writing easier. The chatbot can now format notes into a newsletter, script outline, or marketing plan draft and export everything to Google Docs with one click. You can also pin notes to a Noteboard space, save and pin responses from the chatbot as notes, and hide the source material to focus on jotting down your thoughts. You can ask the AI to focus on certain sources and jump to a citation from a chat response or saved note. NotebookLM will also suggest actions based on selected text or notes, such as combining notes, summarizing them, creating an outline, or a study guide.