Why Google Labs Experiments Matter in the AI Era

google labs experiments

Google labs experiments are the testing ground where Google's most innovative AI technologies are born and refined. If you're exploring Google Labs, here's what you need to know:

  • What it is: Google Labs is the official platform where Google releases early-stage AI experiments for public testing and feedback
  • Current focus: 35+ AI experiments ranging from creative tools to productivity agents, powered by advanced models like Gemini 2.0
  • Key experiments: AISOMA (AI choreography), CC (Gmail productivity agent), Disco (web AI features), Pomelli (branded content creation), and Doppl (personalized fashion)
  • Search innovations: AI Overviews (appearing in 75% of problem-solving queries) and AI Mode (conversational search experience)
  • How to access: Through Search Labs in the Google app, becoming a Trusted Tester, or joining the Google Labs Discord community

The landscape of search and digital interaction is changing fast. What began as a simple collection of experimental projects has evolved into Google's primary innovation lab for artificial intelligence. These aren't just quirky side projects anymore—they're reshaping how we search, create content, and interact with information online.

For business owners and marketers, understanding these experiments isn't optional. AI Overviews now dominate three-quarters of problem-solving searches. AI Mode is testing a completely conversational search experience that could replace traditional results pages. The impact on organic traffic, click-through rates, and digital strategy is already measurable—and significant.

But it's not all challenges. These experiments also create new opportunities for visibility, brand authority, and user engagement. The businesses that understand how to optimize for AI-generated summaries, conversational queries, and multimodal search will gain a competitive edge in an increasingly AI-driven marketplace.

I'm Stephen Gardner, founder of HuskyTail Digital Marketing, and I've been tracking the evolution of google labs experiments closely to help businesses adapt their SEO and digital strategies for this new AI-first search environment. Over 20 years in digital marketing has taught me that early adopters of emerging technologies gain the most sustainable advantages—and Google Labs is where those technologies are being tested right now.

Infographic showing the lifecycle of a Google Labs experiment: Step 1 - Idea Generation (Google teams and DeepMind develop AI concepts), Step 2 - Limited Beta Testing (Select users provide feedback through Search Labs or Trusted Tester programs), Step 3 - Iteration and Refinement (User feedback shapes features and capabilities), Step 4 - Expanded Rollout (Successful experiments reach more users and regions), Step 5 - Integration or Archive (Experiments either become core product features or are archived for learnings) - google labs experiments infographic

Handy google labs experiments terms:

What is Google Labs and How Has It Evolved?

A timeline of Google's experimental platforms, from the original Google Labs to the current AI-focused version - google labs experiments

Google Labs has always been a hub for innovation, a place where Google engineers and researchers could release their wildest ideas. In its earliest incarnation, dating back to 2002, it was a public showcase for various experimental products, from early versions of Gmail features to niche search tools. The purpose was clear: to test new concepts, gather user feedback, and see what resonated before integrating successful ideas into mainstream products or, sometimes, letting them fade away.

Over time, the platform has seen several changes. What was once known as "Experiments with Google" served as a vibrant community platform for 14 years, inspiring countless individuals from classrooms to even aiding in the exploration of Mars. This era celebrated a broad spectrum of digital creativity and technological exploration. However, as the digital landscape shifted, so did Google's focus. We saw a transition where "Experiments with Google" became an archival site, a testament to past innovations, while the torch of active experimentation passed to a new, more focused platform: the current Google Labs.

Today, Google Labs has a singular, pronounced mission: it is explicitly the home for AI experiments at Google. This evolution reflects Google's strategic pivot towards artificial intelligence as the core driver of future technology. The current focus is entirely on AI, leveraging advanced models like Gemini 2.0 to push the boundaries of what's possible. This dedicated focus allows Google to channel its immense resources into developing cutting-edge AI, ensuring a streamlined user feedback loop for responsible development and scaling of these transformative technologies.

The Core Mission: Shaping the Future of AI

At its heart, the purpose of Google Labs remains consistent with its historical roots: to innovate, iterate, and ultimately improve the user experience across Google's vast ecosystem. However, with its new AI-centric mandate, the mission has become even more critical. Google Labs is where we, as users, get a first look at the latest AI experimental products. It's a unique opportunity to participate directly in shaping the future of technology.

We're invited to provide feedback directly to the development teams, playing a crucial role in refining these AI technologies. This active engagement helps Google responsibly scale these experiments, ensuring that when they do graduate into mainstream products, they are robust, user-friendly, and aligned with real-world needs. From niche projects that solve specific problems to broader applications that could become everyday tools, user participation is key to this evolutionary process.

A New Era Focused on Artificial Intelligence

The shift to an AI-first approach for Google Labs isn't just a rebranding; it's a fundamental change in strategy. This new era sees Google Labs as the vanguard of Google's extensive AI research and development efforts. It's not uncommon to see deep integration with Google DeepMind, bringing together some of the brightest minds in AI to tackle complex challenges.

In what many are calling an "AI arms race," Google Labs plays a pivotal role. It's where groundbreaking AI concepts are tested in real-world scenarios, far beyond theoretical models. This includes the development of state-of-the-art image and video models, as well as more accessible mainstream research tools like NotebookLM. These tools, and the experiments they power, aim to make AI more approachable and useful for everyone, from professional developers to curious individuals. The platform proudly declares its purpose: providing tools for anyone to create, learn, develop and play with the future of AI. We can also look to Lab Sessions: Innovative AI collaborations for insights into how Google is partnering to push these boundaries.

A Tour of the Most Notable Google Labs Experiments

A collage showcasing different Google Labs experiments like AISOMA, Pomelli, and Disco - google labs experiments

With Google Labs now boasting 35 different experiments in various stages of development, there's a rich mix of innovation to explore. Some are already gaining traction, while others are niche and obscure, waiting for their moment in the spotlight. These google labs experiments span a wide range of applications, from releaseing creativity to boosting productivity and enhancing our understanding of the world. They are truly tools for anyone to create, learn, develop and play with the future of AI.

Releaseing Creativity with AI

Google Labs is a playground for artistic and creative endeavors, demonstrating how AI can augment human imagination.

  • AISOMA: This fascinating AI Choreography tool, developed in collaboration with Google Arts & Culture, generates original dance phrases rooted in Sir Wayne McGregor's choreography archive. It's a remarkable blend of art and technology, offering new ways to explore movement. We can Try AISOMA Now to see AI's potential in the performing arts.
  • Blob Opera: A truly delightful and whimsical experiment where you can create your own opera using four interactive blobs. Each blob sings a different vocal part, and you can manipulate their pitch and vowel sounds to compose unique musical pieces. It's intuitive, fun, and a testament to AI's ability to make complex creative processes accessible.
  • Teachable Machine: Ever wanted to train your own machine learning model without writing a single line of code? Teachable Machine allows us to do just that, using our webcam or microphone to create models that can recognize images, sounds, or poses. It's an incredible tool for understanding the basics of AI and building simple, interactive projects.
  • Pomelli: This experiment, born from a collaboration between Google Labs and DeepMind, is an AI-powered tool designed to help small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) quickly generate branded social media campaigns. Pomelli scans a business's website to build its "Business DNA" – analyzing tone, colors, fonts, and images – then generates campaign ideas and editable, branded assets. It's particularly useful for SMBs facing time and budget constraints, offering a significant jumpstart in content creation. While a powerful brainstorming tool, we at HuskyTail Digital Marketing know it's still crucial to have human creative professionals refine these AI-generated ideas for optimal impact and strategic storytelling.

Our top 3 creative AI experiments are:

  1. AISOMA: For pushing the boundaries of dance and movement.
  2. Blob Opera: For making music creation universally fun and accessible.
  3. Pomelli: For democratizing branded content creation for businesses.

Boosting Productivity and Personalization

Beyond creativity, google labs experiments are also focused on making our daily lives more efficient and custom to our individual needs.

  • CC Gmail agent: Imagine an experimental AI productivity agent embedded directly in Gmail. CC provides a personalized email briefing every morning, summarizing key communications, and can be emailed anytime for help with tasks. This hints at a future where our inboxes are actively managed by intelligent assistants.
  • Doppl fashion app: This experimental app from Google Labs allows users to find, try on, and shop personalized looks. Leveraging AI, Doppl aims to revolutionize how we interact with fashion, offering highly customized recommendations and virtual try-on experiences. This addresses a significant market gap in personalized shopping.
  • Disco: A new place to test AI features for the web, Disco's first feature is GenTabs. This innovative tool remixes our open browser tabs into custom apps using the power of Gemini 3. It's an intriguing concept that could fundamentally change how we organize and interact with information online, making our web browsing experience more integrated and efficient. We've been following this closely at HuskyTail Digital Marketing, as we explore Google Disco and the potential of the Google Disco Browser for our clients.
  • Google app for Windows: This app offers quick access to Google with a simple keyboard shortcut, allowing us to search anything on our screen, find files, and use AI Mode. It brings the power of Google's AI directly to our desktop, streamlining workflows and information retrieval. You can Learn More about this convenient tool.

Exploring the World Through New Lenses

Google Labs also offers a suite of experiments that allow us to learn, explore, and connect with culture and history in unprecedented ways.

  • Access Mars: Explore the real surface of Mars as captured by the Curiosity Rover. It’s like having a personal space mission at our fingertips, offering an immersive educational experience.
  • Radio Garden: This experiment allows us to tune into live radio stations from across the globe by simply navigating a virtual globe. It's a fantastic way to explore different cultures through their soundscapes.
  • Fabricius hieroglyphics decoder: Developed in collaboration with the Australian Centre for Egyptology at Macquarie University, Fabricius uses machine learning to help decode ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs. It’s an incredible example of AI preserving and making accessible historical knowledge.
  • Notable Women: See 100 historic American women where they've historically been left out: U.S. currency. This experiment uses augmented reality to place notable women on dollar bills, offering a powerful educational and historical experience.These, along with many others listed under "Experiments for Learning," showcase Google's commitment to making education interactive and engaging, turning complex subjects into accessible experiences.

The Search Revolution: AI Overviews vs. AI Mode

The integration of AI into Google Search is arguably one of the most impactful developments stemming from google labs experiments. The way users find information is undergoing a profound change, directly influencing user experience and search behavior. This new era of Search Generative Experience (SGE) brings features like AI Overviews and the emerging AI Mode, both of which we can explore further through Search Labs.

Understanding Google AI Overviews (AIO)

Google AI Overviews (AIO) have rapidly become a prominent feature in search results. An AIO provides an AI-generated summary at the top of traditional search engine results pages (SERPs), compiling information from multiple relevant sources into one cohesive answer. This aims to give users quick, direct answers without needing to click through to individual websites.

The impact of AIO is already significant. Statistics show that AI Overviews feature in three-quarters of all problem-solving queries, meaning a vast number of users are encountering these summaries. This leads to an increase in "no-click searches," where users' queries are satisfied directly on the SERP. While convenient for users, this presents a new challenge for website owners.

It's worth noting that Google has been actively experimenting with how AI Overviews select and display citations. After the March 2025 core update, for instance, AI Overviews were reportedly less likely to cite pages in Google’s top 10 organic results. This indicates an evolving algorithm that prioritizes authoritative, original content regardless of its traditional ranking, or even links to other Google search results for deeper exploration. For more on how these changes affect businesses, especially those in specific regions, check out our insights on More info about AIO Geo.

Diving Deeper with Google AI Mode (GAM)

While AI Overviews offer summaries, Google AI Mode (GAM) represents an even more ambitious leap in search technology. Powered by the advanced Gemini 2.0 model, AI Mode is an AI-powered, multimodal search experience that transforms the search process into a conversational interaction, akin to chatting with an intelligent assistant.

Key features of GAM include a conversational interface where users can ask follow-up questions, multimodal capabilities allowing for text, voice, and image inputs, and a "Query Fan-Out Technique." This technique breaks down complex questions into subtopics and performs multiple related searches simultaneously to deliver comprehensive, nuanced responses. AI Mode also provides source attribution with clickable links and presents dynamic, visually rich summaries custom to user intent.

Currently, AI Mode is an experimental feature available to a limited group of testers, including Google One AI Premium subscribers, through Google Search Labs. It was introduced as a beta feature in March 2025, initially focusing on English-language searches in the U.S. and is expected to expand globally. Google has indicated that AI Mode follows the same ranking and quality systems that power Search, and it's likely to be the testing ground for new capabilities that will eventually graduate into core Search.

| Feature/Impact | AI Overviews (AIO) | AI Mode (GAM) Google The user wants to rewrite the content for a new platform, keeping the meaning the same but changing the phrasing, sentence structure, and possibly word choice to be fresh and engaging for SEO. I should also check the length and ensure it's suitable for the given context (around 2500 words for the whole article, so each section needs to be substantial).

Let's focus on the "Diving Deeper with Google AI Mode (GAM)" section.

Original content to rephrase/expand:"While AI Overviews offer summaries, Google AI Mode (GAM) represents an even more ambitious leap in search technology. Powered by the advanced Gemini 2.0 model, AI Mode is an AI-powered, multimodal search experience that transforms the search process into a conversational interaction, akin to chatting with an intelligent assistant.

Key features of GAM include a conversational interface where users can ask follow-up questions, multimodal capabilities allowing for text, voice, and image inputs, and a "Query Fan-Out Technique." This technique breaks down complex questions into subtopics and performs multiple related searches simultaneously to deliver comprehensive, nuanced responses. AI Mode also provides source attribution with clickable links and presents dynamic, visually rich summaries custom to user intent.

Currently, AI Mode is an experimental feature available to a limited group of testers, including Google One AI Premium subscribers, through Google Search Labs. It was introduced as a beta feature in March 2025, initially focusing on English-language searches in the U.S. and is expected to expand globally. Google has indicated that AI Mode follows the same ranking and quality systems that power Search, and it's likely to be the testing ground for new capabilities that will eventually graduate into core Search."

My plan:

  1. Start with a strong hook for GAM, contrasting it more sharply with AIO.
  2. Elaborate on Gemini 2.0's role, hinting at its power.
  3. Expand on "conversational interaction", describing the user experience more vividly.
  4. Detail multimodal capabilities, giving examples of how text, voice, and image inputs would work.
  5. Explain the "Query Fan-Out Technique" in simpler, more engaging terms, perhaps with an analogy.
  6. Discuss source attribution and dynamic summaries, emphasizing their benefits.
  7. Provide more context on accessibility and rollout, including the limited tester group and geographical expansion.
  8. Reinforce its "testing ground" nature, linking it back to the purpose of google labs experiments.
  9. Integrate statistics and unique insights from the research (e.g., "query fan-out" performs multiple searches, priority for YouTube/Reddit/LinkedIn, ~85% thumbnails).
  10. Maintain the first-person plural, warm, clear tone.
  11. Ensure appropriate length for this sub-section within the overall article.

Let's try to make it fresh and engaging.

Constraint Checklist & Confidence Score:

  1. News Article Format: Yes (News Article implies a guide-like structure for SEO, which is what I'm doing)
  2. Keyword "google labs experiments": Yes
  3. All 10 KQs answered: Will ensure as I go.
  4. Relevant statistics used: Yes
  5. External MD links included: Yes
  6. Internal MD links included: Yes
  7. Pillar pages for CTA: Yes (in conclusion)
  8. Info writer, expert in simple language: Yes
  9. Expert in topic: Yes
  10. Body of article: Yes
  11. Standard Github markdown: Yes
  12. No non-standard characters: Yes
  13. No 4+ space indentation: Yes
  14. Links standard markdown, no backticks: Yes
  15. Links NOT formatted as code: Yes
  16. Use research where relevant: Yes
  17. Own expert knowledge: Yes
  18. Don't make up things: Yes
  19. Use facts, stats, insights, opinions, news: Yes
  20. First person plural: Yes
  21. At least 4 graphics: Yes
  22. Graphics syntax exact: Yes
  23. Article about 2500 words: Will monitor length.
  24. Outrank other articles: Aim for comprehensive and well-structured.
  25. Simple, clear, warm style: Yes
  26. Humor where appropriate: Yes
  27. All topics covered, all questions answered: Yes
  28. Exhaustively use all relevant info: Yes
  29. No placeholders: Yes
  30. All image sources correct: Yes
  31. Intro included as is: Yes
  32. Keywords mentioned where relevant: Yes
  33. Hearts for Huskies URL: Yes
  34. Tagline: Yes
  35. Geography constraint: Yes (Will be careful about this).

Confidence Score: 5/5

Strategizing complete. I will now proceed with generating the article based on this detailed plan.