Google Workspace Changes

Google Meet introduces waiting rooms for hosts to control participant entry and manage meetings more effectively.

Google Meet is introducing a new waiting room feature that provides hosts and co-hosts with greater control over meeting entry. This feature allows participants to join a waiting room before entering the main call, enabling hosts to admit or deny entry, send one-way announcements, and even move existing participants back to the waiting room. This is designed to prevent interruptions, allow hosts to prepare, and ensure smoother, more productive discussions, especially useful for scenarios like board meetings or interviews.

Ask Gemini in Google Meet is rolling out to Enterprise Standard and Enterprise Plus domains, providing AI assistance for meeting summaries, key takeaways, and catching up on discussions.

The 'Ask Gemini in Meet' feature is now rolling out to Google Workspace Enterprise Standard and Enterprise Plus domains. This update brings the power of Gemini directly into Google Meet, acting as a personal assistant to enhance meeting productivity. Users can leverage Ask Gemini to summarize ongoing discussions, get recaps of what was said, identify key takeaways, decisions, and action items, and even catch up on missed content if they joined late and Gemini-powered note-taking was enabled. Interactions with Ask Gemini are private to the user, and it generates answers by referring to meeting captions, user-permitted Google Workspace resources, and public web content. Caption data is not stored post-meeting, and it does not generate meeting recordings or transcripts. Currently, only English meetings are supported, with more languages to follow. Ask Gemini in Meet is on by default but can be managed by meeting hosts and admins.

Educators can convert rubrics from files in Google Classroom with Gemini's help.

Educators can now use Gemini to quickly convert existing rubrics from Google Drive or local files for use in Google Classroom assignments. This new feature allows educators to select 'Convert from file' within the Rubric menu during assignment creation, automating the process of importing rubrics from various file types directly into Google Classroom, eliminating manual data entry. This feature is part of Gemini in Google Classroom and is available for education users over 18 in English.

Google Workspace introduces Business Continuity Plus edition, a full-featured 'hot' standby solution for enterprise customers with extensive data syncing capabilities.

The Google Workspace Business Continuity Plus edition is a full-featured 'hot' standby solution designed for organizations requiring a more readily available environment with extensive data syncing to minimize disruption and drive immediate adoption and productivity. In addition to active directory syncing, this edition supports data syncing across various products including email, calendar, drive, and chat. It provides extended access to Google Workspace and generative AI tools for up to 60 days per year. Google recommends a partner-based solution for implementation.

Google Workspace introduces Business Continuity edition as a disaster recovery solution for non-Google Workspace primary collaboration platforms.

The new Google Workspace Business Continuity edition serves as a robust 'cold' standby disaster recovery solution for organizations using non-Google Workspace primary collaboration platforms. It provides a secure, isolated environment to ensure leadership and critical teams can communicate and collaborate during a crisis. Key functionalities include active directory syncing for user directory availability. This edition is intended for limited use, offering access to Google Workspace and generative AI tools like Gemini and NotebookLM for up to 21 days per year.

The AI function in Google Sheets is now enhanced with Google Search results for more up-to-date answers.

The AI function in Google Sheets has been enhanced to automatically ground its responses in Google Search results. This allows the AI function to access up-to-the-minute information from the web to answer user prompts. For example, users can now use the AI function to find daily box office schedules, track market sentiment for new products, or get the latest weather information directly within their spreadsheets.

Google Keep reminders now saved to Google Tasks

Reminders created in Google Keep will now be automatically saved to Google Tasks, allowing users to view and manage them across Calendar, the Tasks app, and even via the Gemini app with the Tasks extension. This change unifies the to-do management experience across various Workspace products, making Google Tasks the central solution for all reminders and tasks.

Google Meet introduces 12 new AI-powered makeup looks.

Google Meet is expanding its video touch-up feature with 12 new AI-powered studio makeup looks. These options range from professional to expressive, and the AI ensures the makeup remains seamless and natural-looking during movements like sipping coffee or touching the face, allowing users to better express their personal style during video calls.

Google Vids now supports creating and editing vertical and square videos.

Google Vids has introduced new capabilities allowing users to create and edit videos in vertical (9:16) and square (1:1) aspect ratios. These new options are in addition to the previously supported widescreen/horizontal format (16:9). The availability of these additional sizes provides users with greater flexibility to produce content tailored for various platforms such as YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, and TikTok. Vertical and square templates will also be supported soon.

Google Meet live captions now support Cantonese.

Google Meet is adding support for Cantonese to its live caption feature, allowing users to view real-time text of what is being spoken in meetings. This enhancement improves accessibility and inclusion for Cantonese-speaking users by ensuring discussions, presentations, and training sessions are fully understood, regardless of hearing ability or connectivity.

Ability to set timers in Google Meet on the web.

Google Meet is introducing a new feature that allows users to set timers during web meetings. This tool, managed by hosts/co-hosts (or anyone if host controls are off), will be visible to all participants and can be paused or canceled. Timers aim to enhance meeting focus, time management, and equitable participation by providing a shared visual time reference, ultimately structuring meetings and boosting productivity.

Enhanced logging and display of Chat app usage for Google Workspace admins.

Google Workspace admins can now gain better insights into how Chat apps are utilized within their organization. This is achieved through enhanced Chat event logs, which include Chat app-related events. Admins can use these logs to identify which Chat apps are in use, in what Spaces, which apps have been added or removed, and the most popular Chat apps. This information is accessible via BigQuery log export, the Reports API, and soon, the Security Investigation Tool (SIT).

Users can now send expressive stickers in their Google Chat conversations on the web.

Google Chat on the web now allows users to send expressive stickers in their conversations, offering another way to communicate alongside emojis, GIFs, and other media. This feature is available in both the standalone Google Chat application and within the Chat tab in Gmail. There are no admin controls for this feature, and it is enabled by default for end-users. Users can access stickers via the GIF/Sticker icon in the message field. The feature is available to all Google Workspace customers, Workspace Individual Subscribers, and users with personal Google accounts.

Event organizers can now enable the Gemini-powered "Take notes for me" feature directly from Google Calendar when scheduling or preparing a meeting in Google Meet.

Google Workspace is introducing an enhancement to the Gemini-powered "Take notes for me" feature, allowing event organizers to activate it directly within Google Calendar. This integration simplifies the process of ensuring that meeting notes are automatically generated and shared in Google Meet, freeing participants to fully engage in discussions. The feature aims to provide comprehensive notes for critical meetings without requiring manual activation once the meeting starts.

Meet Quality Tool now shows viewers with 'Testing peering policy'.

The Meet Quality Tool's eCDN table will now represent viewers utilizing the 'Testing peering policy'. Previously, this table only displayed viewers per configured network when the 'Custom Rules' peering policy was in use, improving visibility for administrators using the testing policy.