Google's Conversational Search Is Now Live for Everyone

Google just released Search Live to everyone in the United States, following an open beta period. Instead of typing your questions, you can have a full-on conversation with an AI assistant in real time, and you can even use your phone's camera to show it what you're talking about.

You can check it out by opening the Google app on your Android or iOS device and tapping the new "Live" button right under the search bar. Once you're live, you can start asking questions out loud. If you need to show Google what's going on, you can also turn on your camera. Another way to access it is through the Google Lens app.

If you're already using Lens, you'll see a new "Live" option at the bottom of the screen. In that mode, your camera is automatically enabled, so you can just start talking and get a back-and-forth conversation going about whatever you see in front of you.

The biggest change here is that Google is moving beyond just text-based search. It's a multimodal experience that lets you get answers while you're actively doing something. For example, Google says you can use Search Live to learn how to make matcha. You can point your camera at the tools you have and ask what each one is for, or ask for dairy-free or low-sugar ingredient substitutions.

Google is pushing the idea that the troubleshooting potential is one of the best parts of this. I do see how good this could be for troubleshooting problems with wires and setups for devices, but it could go wrong quickly. AI is often wrong, and you could do damage and void warranties if you mess with a device in a way you shouldn't.

Google's example is to point your camera at your home theater system and ask which cable goes where, which is the most basic part of setting up a home system. If you don't know what cables to put in while setting up a home theater, you probably should be paying someone else because there's so much more to it.

Google also gave an example of using AI as a learning partner for school projects. As the chemical reactions happen, you can ask Google to explain the science behind them, or get links for more fun experiments. I have used Google for homework help for my son in middle school, and it was wrong most of the time. I used it for science, math, history, and reading, and it was very unhelpful. So, I wouldn't recommend using it at all for schoolwork.

Google previously rolled out Search Live as part of a limited test within Google Labs. It was an opt-in feature that users had to enable. Now it's officially available to everyone in the U.S., with no Labs opt-in required.

Search Live has a lot of cool uses, but it's mostly just a Google AI you can speak to with a camera to show what you mean. This doesn't mean the AI is somehow more reliable, but you can use it for basic tasks that would be a Google search away from an answer.

Source: Google