Google is testing its ‘Ask Photos’ AI assistant that understands what’s in your photos

Google is testing new “Ask for photos” feature that lets you explore your photo library in modern ways. The feature, which Google first released in May, is rolling out to select Google Labs users in the U.S. and lets you ask questions like “Where did we camp the last time we were in Yosemite?” or “What did we eat at the hotel in Stanley?”

The Photos app, powered by Google’s Gemini AI models, will suggest answers based on the content of your photos and also display images related to your question.

Google says you can even employ Ask Photos to complete tasks like summarizing the things you did on your last vacation or choosing the best photos of your family to put in a shared album. You can sign up for a waitlist to get access to Ask Photos at Google website.

When using Ask Photos, Google will allow you to change to what it now calls “classic search” — or the current way of finding images. But Google is also improving that, because now you can search for images using natural language, like “Alice and I laughing” or “Kayaking on a lake surrounded by mountains.” You can then sort the search results by date or relevance. The feature is rolling out in English on Android and iOS, with more support for other languages ​​coming in the “coming weeks.”

In preparation for this change, Google Photos has replaced the Library tab with a modern Collections page that aims to make it easier to find all of your photos and videos. While I haven’t had time to explore the modern tab, I’m definitely going to be using natural language search so I can finally find specific images without having to scroll through thousands of images or narrow them down by location.