In its annual event, I/O,¹ and in a blog post² on May 20, 2025, Google unveiled new capabilities regarding its search function alongside demonstrations. While representatives of Google discussed many new features during I/O, in this blog post I focus on three features: Deep Search in AI Mode, Search Live, and AI mode’s ability to make suggestions and reiterate the importance of searching within a variety of sources.

Search within a variety of platforms.

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Deep Search in AI Mode can create a report on a variety of topics, with citations, in a matter of minutes.³ This report-creation is all well and good, however, what about the process of thinking about what websites to search within and how to select search terms and develop search strings? Although, sometimes people need fast answers, thinking about how to form searches is part of searching and can inform the critical evaluation of search results. Moreover, will these easily-generated reports replace traditional searches in search engines? Will Google provide any explanation as to why some sources are included and others are excluded from these reports?

Another feature of AI mode makes suggestions based on a person’s past actions. For example, when Google knows restaurants that a person has searched for in the past, AI mode can make suggestions for additional restaurants based on that person’s searches.⁴ In addition, AI mode can suggest local events near where a person will be during a certain time based on flight and hotel booking confirmations that are in a person’s Gmail inbox.⁵ This is a lot of bespoke information that Google has to work with. What if a person does not want Google to make recommendations of events and venues based on past searches and emailed flight and hotel confirmations? Does Google provide the option to turn off these recommendations?

Search Live is another new feature that allows a person to view an item using a camera and speak to Search Live about the item. Via the camera, Search Live sees the same thing that the person sees, offers commentary, and provides links to websites, videos, forums, etc.⁶ Again, I ask about the process of thinking about where to find information: will people have their research begin and end with Google? Ready-made suggestions of where to look next are convenient, however, people conducting searches should remember to search within a variety of places and evaluate search results. Just because there are many results or a report with citations available in one platform does not mean that one is receiving complete information. A time-tested practice of a good researcher is to search in a variety of sources.

During I/O, Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google said that Google’s mission is “to [o]rganize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. No product embodies our mission more than Google Search.”⁷ The new features described above are organizing the world’s information and making this information more accessible. However, people should not exchange thinking about how to form searches for the opportunity to obtain quick and relevant answers. In addition, there are still processes at work that may include and exclude information without explanation. Therefore, people conducting searches, should not put all their eggs in one basket. Instead, they should search within a variety of platforms.

1. Google, Google I/O ’25 Keynote, YouTube (May 20, 2025), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8NiE3XMPrM [https://perma.cc/469G-YHDU].[↩]
2. Elizabeth Reid, AI in Search: Going beyond information to intelligence, The Keyword (May 20, 2025), https://blog.google/products/search/google-search-ai-mode-update/ [https://perma.cc/YXW5-FJ89].[↩]
3. Id.[↩]
4. Id.[↩]
5. Id.[↩]
6. Id.[↩]
7. Google, supra note 1.[↩]