Google is renaming NotebookLM to Gemini Notebook, bringing the product under the Gemini brand while keeping it as a standalone application. The Verge reported the change on July 16, 2026. Gemini Notebook will integrate more deeply across the Gemini app and Google Search, and Google plans to bring notebooks into AI Mode, the chatbot-like experience within Search The Verge.

The product's history goes back to May 2023, when Google first showed it as Project Tailwind. It launched publicly as NotebookLM in July 2023. Google expanded the feature set over time, most notably adding AI-generated podcast summaries of users' notes in September 2024. More recent additions include a visual source-exploration tool introduced in Google's May 2025 Workspace feature drop, which lets users explore connections between sources like Docs, Slides, and websites, and the August 2025 Workspace Drop on August 27, 2025, which brought additional AI capabilities to NotebookLM and Sheets.

The deeper Gemini app integration is already partly underway. Google recently began letting users connect their NotebookLM notebooks to the Gemini app, and the rename formalizes the brand alignment.

A notable new capability is cloud-based code execution. Gemini Notebook can connect to a secure cloud computer to write and run code — think of it like having a lightweight programming environment built into your note-taking app, so you can test ideas against your sources without switching tools. That feature is currently available to Google AI Ultra and Workspace business customers, and Google says it will roll out to Pro users on the web over the coming weeks.

The broader context here is one of brand consolidation and expanding reach. Google has been steadily unifying its AI products under the Gemini name, and NotebookLM, which built its own considerable user recognition, now joins that umbrella. What is changing goes beyond labeling. By bringing notebooks into AI Mode in Search and tightening the connection to the Gemini app, Google is positioning Gemini Notebook less as a standalone research tool and more as a node within a broader AI workflow — one that spans search, conversation, and document analysis.

The code-execution feature pushes the product into territory occupied by tools like Jupyter notebooks (interactive coding environments popular among data scientists) and AI coding assistants. Running code in a secure cloud sandbox within a note-taking and source-grounding context suggests Google sees value in closing the loop between reading, reasoning over sources, and testing ideas computationally within a single environment. Restricting initial access to Ultra and Workspace business tiers, with a staged Pro rollout, is a familiar pattern for Google's higher-compute features.

What remains intact is the standalone app itself. Despite the rename and the deeper integrations, Gemini Notebook persists as its own application rather than being absorbed entirely into the Gemini app or Search. That decision leaves the product's existing workflows largely in place while the integration layers get built around them.

For organizations already using NotebookLM within Workspace, the practical near-term changes are twofold: the brand they interact with changes, and the code-execution capability, where available, adds a computational dimension to what has been a text-and-source-centric tool. The Pro-tier rollout of code execution, once it lands, widens that capability's reach substantially.

Google's trajectory with this product has been incremental and steady rather than dramatic. From its origins as Project Tailwind, through the podcast-summary feature that drew widespread attention, to the visual source-exploration tools and now cloud code execution, the product has accumulated capabilities at a measured pace. The rename to Gemini Notebook is the clearest signal yet that Google views it as a core component of its Gemini strategy rather than an experimental side project, and the Search and Gemini app integrations are the mechanism for making that strategy concrete.