Google’s NotebookLM Goes Vocal: AI Explains Complex Topics Out Loud

Google announced on Wednesday that its AI note-taking and research app, NotebookLM, is adding an “Audio Overview” feature. Audio Overview will give users another way to digest and comprehend the information in the documents they have uploaded to the app, such as course readings or legal briefs.

Since its launch, NotebookLM has used text to summarize and explain source materials, but now, it can do so out loud using audio. The feature is geared toward people who grasp materials better by listening to explanations as opposed to reading them.

AI-generated virtual hosts will use conversational speech patterns to give you a summary of the materials you have shared. The hosts will share facts or compelling topics from the source material and do things like use metaphors to explain complicated concepts. Google says that listening to these discussions will help users find new connections between their documents or get inspiration for their drafts.

To get started with Audio Overview, you need to open an existing notebook, navigate to the Notebook guide, and click on the “generate” button on the right-hand side. It can take up to five minutes for an audio conversation to generate, and for now, you can only generate conversations in English.

You also have the option to download the conversation and listen to it on the go to get a quick understanding of your source materials.

Audio conversations are still in beta and there may be some inaccuracies in the conversations, Google says.

The company first demoed NotebookLM under the name Project Tailwind back in June 2023 at Google I/O before making it available to everyone above the age of 18 in the U.S. last December. The app is now available in over 200 countries in more than 108 languages.