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Google lastly launches NotebookLM cellular app at I/O: hands-on, first impressions


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Among the many quite a few bulletins search big Google made this week in the course of the 2025 version of its annual I/O developer convention (wanting “enter/output”), one of the notable for enterprise leaders is that it’s lastly bringing its hit conversational AI software Pocket book LM, beforehand out there solely on the net, to the Google Play and Apple App Shops.

NotebookLM, in the event you’re not already a person and don’t recall, is a free Google AI-powered service that started as a manner for customers to add and question paperwork through textual content, solely to change into an exceedingly in style AI podcast generator, full with two extraordinarily personable default AI host voices — one masculine and one female — that banter and intonate very equally to actual individuals about no matter topics the person desires, guided by user-uploaded PDFs, hyperlinks, and even YouTube movies.

Sturdy person demand drives cellular launch

The cellular app addresses one of the frequent person requests: a manner to make use of NotebookLM past the desktop.

In accordance with a weblog put up by Biao Wang, Product Supervisor at Google Labs, many customers needed the power to take heed to summaries, work together with AI hosts, and share content material to NotebookLM immediately from their telephones.

The discharge has seen sturdy early momentum. Inside 24 hours of launch, the app reached the quantity two place within the Productiveness class of the Apple App Retailer and positioned ninth general.

In the meantime, site visitors analytics agency Similarweb reported that month-to-month visits to NotebookLM’s platform elevated by 56% over the previous six months to greater than 48 million vists, citing a powerful adoption price.

Cellular-first options deal with offline and multitasking

The NotebookLM cellular app introduces a number of options tailor-made for on-the-go utilization.

Customers can obtain Audio Overviews — AI generated podcast discussions of uploaded paperwork or media—for offline playback — an enormous unlock for these eager to take audio summaries with them on hikes, on the subway, or wherever the place cell and wi-fi service is missing.

Whether or not commuting or coping with restricted connectivity, customers can proceed listening with out interruption.

Moreover, Audio Overviews help background playback, enabling customers to pay attention whereas utilizing different apps or performing different duties on their gadgets.

Interactive AI hosts add dynamic engagement

A brand new layer of interactivity is constructed into the cellular expertise. When linked to the web, customers can faucet a “Be part of” button throughout playback to ask the AI hosts questions, redirect the abstract circulate, and even request light-hearted content material.

This real-time engagement permits for a extra customized and versatile understanding of advanced supplies.

Simple content material sharing from any app

The app additionally streamlines the method of including new supply supplies. Customers looking a web site, viewing a PDF, or watching a YouTube video can share that content material on to NotebookLM through their cellphone’s native share menu.

The preliminary model helps three enter varieties—web sites, PDFs, and YouTube hyperlinks—with extra codecs deliberate for future updates.

Out there now on iOS and Android

NotebookLM’s app is on the market instantly for obtain. It helps iPhones and iPads operating iOS 17 or later, in addition to Android telephones and tablets operating Android 10 or larger.

The model launched is described as a Minimal Viable Product (MVP), with ongoing enhancements anticipated based mostly on person enter.

The event staff has inspired suggestions by way of social media and its group channels, notably round which options from the online app must be prioritized for cellular.

Video Overviews on the best way

Along with the launch, NotebookLM previewed a brand new function: Video Overviews. Set to reach quickly in English, the function will permit customers to generate temporary, animated video summaries from varied content material varieties, together with PDFs and pictures.

The cellular launch represents a key step in NotebookLM’s ongoing product evolution, aiming to make info evaluation and comprehension accessible in additional contexts—whether or not customers are at their desks or on the go.

Arms-on expertise with NotebookLM iOS app reveals promise and pitfalls

My preliminary hands-on exams of the iOS model of NotebookLM reveals a mixture of promise and efficiency gaps.

The core circulate—pasting a URL so as to add it as a supply, producing summaries, and interacting with the AI—is intuitive and in step with the online model’s deal with simplifying advanced content material.

As an example, a supply titled Defined: Neural Networks loaded efficiently, created an summary with 7 sources, and allowed playback of an Audio Overview with customary controls like rewind, quick ahead, and playback velocity changes.

Nevertheless, the expertise wasn’t totally clean.

The app reveals inconsistent conduct when attempting so as to add URLs as sources. In a number of circumstances, including a web site URL failed, ensuing within the error message “Couldn’t add supply.”

This occurred even with typical instructional content material (e.g., pages about how massive language fashions work).

No particulars had been supplied by the app about why these URLs failed—whether or not resulting from unsupported codecs, website restrictions, or community points. This lack of suggestions makes troubleshooting tough for customers.

Whereas switching between notebooks, the app often displayed a message stating “Couldn’t load notebooks.”

This occurred throughout navigation between beforehand created notebooks and whereas making an attempt to create or entry new ones.

The loading message “This may occasionally take 10–20 seconds” appeared continuously however didn’t at all times resolve, probably leaving customers unsure about whether or not an operation was really profitable or not.

UI polish and real-time response

The interface itself is visually clear and in step with Google’s Materials Design patterns. Nevertheless, delicate usability delays—comparable to loading animations persisting for longer than needed or abstract era pauses—detract from the sense of real-time responsiveness, particularly for customers aware of the online app’s velocity.

Regardless of the above points, some key guarantees of the cellular app had been validated in use. Myu Audio Overview of a Microsoft’s Construct 2025 keynote deal with performed again reliably in offline mode.

The app allowed me to play content material within the background whereas switching to different apps, assembly the multi-tasking help claims outlined within the launch announcement.

NotebookLM on iOS delivers on its foundational promise—bringing AI-assisted understanding to cellular gadgets—however early customers could encounter reliability challenges round content material ingestion and pocket book administration.

Enterprise implications: Why IT leaders and staff managers ought to take discover

For enterprise decision-makers—CTOs, IT admins, and staff leads—NotebookLM is changing into greater than only a private productiveness instrument.

With the introduction of NotebookLM Enterprise, and now NotebookLM Plus, Google is signaling its intent to help professional-grade functions for analysis, collaboration, and data administration throughout organizations.

Initially launched as an AI note-taking instrument constructed with Gemini 1.5 and later upgraded with Flash 2.0, NotebookLM has already confirmed in style amongst college students, researchers, and data employees. However as utilization has expanded, so has Google’s roadmap. NotebookLM Enterprise (now referred to in public updates as NotebookLM Plus) introduces options aimed squarely at enterprise customers:

  • Expanded capability: As much as 5x extra notebooks, sources, and Audio Overviews.
  • Collaboration instruments: Pocket book sharing, shared enhancing, and customization choices for tone, format, and elegance.
  • Utilization analytics: Perception into how groups are interacting with shared content material.
  • Audio enhancements: Crew members can generate and work together with narrated overviews and use voice-based inquiries to discover sources.
  • Integration readiness: Designed for Google Workspace and now Google Agentspace, with inclusion within the Google One AI Premium plan anticipated in 2026.

NotebookLM’s worth proposition for enterprise groups facilities on its RAG (retrieval-augmented era) mannequin, the place customers can create centralized, queryable data bases based mostly on supply supplies. Groups can retailer slide decks, coverage paperwork, onboarding materials, product roadmaps, and even CRM-style interplay logs—all inside shared notebooks. This may dramatically cut back search time and context-switching, notably in knowledge-heavy capabilities like authorized, advertising and marketing, product growth, or analysis.

In an October 2024 interview, Google famous that early enterprise customers reported success utilizing NotebookLM to construct “a centralized repository of staff intelligence”—a function that may assist with mission onboarding, briefing, and data continuity throughout time zones and departments.

NotebookLM’s Audio Overview function, whereas nonetheless experimental, additionally holds potential for enterprise data dissemination. Groups can use it to generate brief, spoken summaries of advanced supplies—splendid for briefings, podcast-style inside communications, or summarizing new product documentation. Latest updates even permit customers to information the dialog or immediate deeper dives into particular matters throughout playback.

Privateness and management for skilled environments

A current onboarding display screen within the app emphasizes that NotebookLM doesn’t use private information to coach fashions.

For enterprise or EDU accounts utilizing Google Drive, information dealing with is ruled by Workspace or Training phrases of service, reinforcing compliance requirements. This distinction could assist NotebookLM move preliminary IT opinions for adoption in regulated industries or organizations with delicate information issues.

Whereas the app nonetheless consists of warnings in regards to the potential for inaccuracies—frequent to generative instruments—NotebookLM is positioned as a data assistant, not a decision-maker. IT leads evaluating it for broader use ought to weigh these limits alongside the instrument’s productiveness and data administration strengths.

Early enterprise customers already onboard

Notably, some early adopters within the startup and enterprise capital sectors have already embraced NotebookLM as a alternative for conventional CRMs or inside wikis. Sam Lessin, former Meta VP of Product and present basic companion at Gradual Ventures, described utilizing NotebookLM as an alternative of a CRM. Others report constructing data hubs round every thing from regulatory compliance to code documentation.

As NotebookLM matures, its rising business-tier capabilities recommend rising alignment with the productiveness and compliance wants of recent groups.


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