AI Premium is one of the tiers offered in the Google One subscriptions that gets you the same benefits as a regular Google One Premium subscription but with a beefed-up version of Google’s Gemini (formerly Bard) chatbot and integration with Google Docs and Gmail. Google One AI Premium costs $19.99 per month. The next closest Google One plan is the 2TB Premium tier, which at half the cost gets you the same benefits sans Gemini Advanced or Gemini integration.

There are pricier Google One tiers that come with more storage, and they also give you access to Gemini, but for a limited time only. At the time of writing, Google provides Gemini Advanced with all plans higher than the 2TB Premium plan until July 31, 2024. We can only speculate that this means Gemini Advanced will be a separate paid add-on for those tiers starting August 1.

What Do You Get With a Subscription?

AI Premium gets you a bunch of different perks spread across Google’s vast ecosystem. It’s hard to list them all, and some are pretty minor, so I’ll just highlight the ones that seemed most notable to me:

• Access to an improved large language model (LLM), which Google calls Gemini Advanced
• Gemini integration with Google Docs and Gmail
• 2TB of cloud storage
• 10% back on Google Store purchases
• Longer Google Meet video calls with additional features like noise cancelation and YouTube streaming
• Special Google Photos editing tools like Magic Eraser
• Dark web monitoring for your personal info
• Google’s VPN service

You’ll want to consider whether you can actually use all of these features to determine the true value of Google One Premium AI. For example, you may already pay for a VPN service or have no plans to stream your video conferences.

Google One Premium AI vs. ChatGPT Plus vs. Copilot Pro

If you’re choosing between premium chatbot subscriptions, on the surface the value propositions seem pretty even, with all three plans running you a cool $20 per month. They all get you the developers’ most powerful available models, and all can parse files you upload, identify image content, and generate synthetic images on command.

Each plan’s usefulness is relative to which ecosystem you spend the most time in. I’m referring to how Gemini Advanced integrates with Google apps while Copilot Pro integrates with Microsoft apps (if you already have a Microsoft 365 subscription). ChatGPT Plus, in contrast, isn’t integrated with nor dependent on a specific ecosystem like Google Workplace or 365 but has “plugins” that integrate with several different third-party services like Kayak and Slack.

Despite even pricing, these plans are noticeably uneven in the perks department: ChatGPT Plus and Copilot Pro don’t get you 2TB of storage or discounts on software like Premium AI does. Also, don’t be caught off-guard by the fact that Copilot Pro’s integration with Office 365 apps relies on you already having a subscription to Microsoft 365, which starts at $70 per year. In contrast, Google’s office productivity apps are completely free.

One place where Google One Premium AI falls short of the competition is in customization. ChatGPT Plus and Copilot Pro both let you build custom “GPTs” or bots pre-programmed to act a certain way for specific tasks in mind. As of March 2024, Gemini Advanced offers no such customization, so you’ll be copy-pasting prompts if you want a specific, custom experience across multiple conversations.

[mai mult...]