I’ve been running Gemini Spark, Google’s 24/7 AI Assistant, and it’s actually pretty useful

Gemini Spark It is Google New agent assistant 24/7is designed to help you “navigate your digital life,” which basically means getting your tasks done online, summarizing things you don’t have time to read (like your entire inbox), or organizing something that would otherwise require a lot of screen-time-filled manual work, like a personal expenses spreadsheet.

Service was first foot At Google’s annual developer conference in May, CEO Sundar Pichai joked that Spark, running on virtual machines in the cloud, meant that “yes, you can close your laptop.” The joke here is that he compares Spark to other agent AI systems, like the popular OpenClaw, which require the machine to be kept awake to run its tasks.

He suggests that Spark is the efficient AI for the rest of us — those who would rather get things done without having to know about it than by setting up an always-on AI machine.

In practice, Spark is still largely designed for work-related tasks, given its integration with Google’s productivity apps like Gmail, Calendar, Docs, Sheets, and Slides. (After all, how often do you prepare a deck in your personal life? Unless you… The Generation Z creator explains Latest meme for your chronically offline friends, right?)

Google is also struggling a bit to come up with real-world examples that would convince someone that Spark is a “must-have” tool rather than a “nice-to-have” tool for personal use.

Among her “personal productivity” suggestions is using Spark to scan your emails and calendar for the day and send you a summary of your top three to-dos, which already assumes you’re someone who writes down your tasks in a calendar or email app, rather than a notepad (virtual or otherwise), or just keeps a running list in your mind. (For example, Get your prescriptions and shampoos at Walgreens. Buy more dog food. Going out with friends on Saturday.)

Google also suggests that you can use Spark as a weekend planner, with the Google Doc wording “suggests three free activities based on my open calendar blocks for the upcoming weekend,” which, again, assumes you’re kind of a scheduling nerd in your offline life.

However, with early access to Gemini Spark, I decided to give it a try, with what might be some realistic suggestions of my own. I was surprised that it was a somewhat useful application of consumer AI, but not an application worthy of its own brand.

Find savings

In one of the initial tasks, I asked Spark to help with shopping-related research. The idea was to help me with a daily trip to a local drugstore to buy household items, so I asked Spark for product suggestions based on weekly deals and coupons I could clip.

At first, Spark seemed to do well here, telling me exactly which products on sale would fit my needs, and suggesting coupons to clip in the Walgreens app for extra savings. She even suggested how I could bundle coupons for one item by combining online promo codes, if I was placing an online pick-up order and was planning to spend more on personal care items.

However, as is often the case with AI, the devil was in the details, as one of the promo codes was invalid when I tried it, despite meeting what the AI ​​said the requirements were. However, Spark pointed me to some other savings — like buy-one-get-one-free deals and rewards that made up for that mistake.

Planning a packing list for a day trip

In another test, I asked Gemini for help with a packing list for a day trip out of town. I asked him to check the weather, gather event details, and make suggestions on what to bring with us, like sunscreen or water, to see what he would bring, after he learned more about the activity. You’ve requested that your final list be imported into Google Keep.

Guess what Spark can’t do? Use Google Keep.

This is a big mistake, since Google’s note-taking app is going to be essential for anything in the realm of personal productivity. Instead, offer to make me a doc or write me an email, because that’s definitely something I want to check off my list of things to bring with me. (??)

However, regarding the list itself, Spark was very thorough, suggesting lawn chairs or blankets, water, sunscreen, sunglasses, a light layer for sunset, a reusable shopping bag, and an umbrella for a possible light shower that day. He also reminded me that no dogs were allowed, even though the event was outdoors. (Sorry, princess!)

Summer camp/activity suggestions

My daughter has outgrown summer camps for kids (and should probably get a job), but before we went that route, I wanted to research the local area to see if there were any summer activities available for teens that she could do in addition to her engineering camp in June. I asked Spark to do a thorough search and find all the suggestions, keeping in mind that we didn’t want to drive more than about 30 minutes.

Spark produced a good list of ideas for activities that matched my child’s interests, charting how far they were from home. Unfortunately, I forgot to ask Spark for software costs or dates, and they didn’t bother to tell me, which means I still have to do a little more manual research myself.

Recurring task: Summarize email newsletters

Like many people, I subscribe to too many newsletters, so I put Spark to work creating a weekly digest for me, which will arrive every Friday, focusing only on the top five posts or articles I shouldn’t miss reading, plus a link.

The AI ​​got to work, searched my inbox, and within moments, provided a summary of several interesting articles to read that included context and link. (The link ended up redirecting to Google.com and didn’t work — I had to click on the link offered on the redirecting page, because it didn’t automatically send me to the site in question.) While I liked the suggestions overall, Spark only returned four articles to read when I requested five. Spark has interpreted the request as “4-5” for a reason.

Recurring Event: Suggest weekend activities

For another request, I asked Spark to compile a list of weekend activities around the city for me on Fridays, so I could plan a fun weekend. As someone who lives in a smaller city, there aren’t always big events or things to do, so making sure you don’t miss the expected street festival or hot parade when it comes to the city is key. But there’s no single source to find everything you have to do — you’ll have to read multiple local newscasts, visit websites and Facebook groups, read the newspaper online, and more.

Instead, Spark set up a web search, combined (at my request) with a search of my Gmail for any relevant local newsletters, summaries, or listings that contained keywords that suggested a local activity suggestion. She then compiled a list of upcoming weekend events and noted that if I wanted to add any of them to my calendar, I could just reply.

If it weren’t for Spark, I would never have known there was an annual beaver pageant nearby, which apparently involves people dressing up in beaver costumes and raising money for wetland conservation? Okay, maybe I need to check that out. (You still have to tell Spark to add it, and then click the button to confirm, but this is easier than the manual work of reading multiple sources of ideas.)

Recurring event: Check for price drops

For my latest order, I put Gemini Spark to work tracking price drops for an expensive eye cream. As a small trader, I would never buy it unless there was a crazy sale. I wanted Spark to track price changes for me and alert me if my eye cream became more affordable. However, Spark’s interpretation of this order was to simply re-examine the price every two weeks to see if it had fallen below my target. I’m not sure that would be frequent enough to spot a deal. (I’ll update if the results are successful, but I think I set a very low bar as my goal—even after raising my bar another $10!—so this is probably just wishful shopping at this point. But I always hope some online retailer makes a pricing mistake someday!)

More ideas to come

I can already see how I’ll be able to integrate Spark into my daily life in other ways too — I already have ideas for more email monitoring and cleaning tasks, for example. Next time I change my home air filter, I’ll ask Spark to remind me to replace it in three months. If I ever decide to take a vacation, I’ll probably have some errands to do too.

Room for improvement

Although the Spark performed fairly well on my tasks with only small quibbles, the biggest criticism I received was that there was no need for this to be a standalone product with a different brand. I think this adds to the consumer confusion in this day and age, where so many things are happening in the field of AI, and where every new model has its own name and number, and some of them are very strange. (Banana nano, anyone?)

Why don’t we introduce Spark as something Gemini can do out of the box, rather than making it their own product? Why should the switch say “Switch to Spark” instead of just “Switch to Tasks”? (If it even needs its own space in the UI!) I personally don’t want to go through the mental burden of trying to decide whether something is a question or a task; I just want to write a question or request and be done with it.

I also think the lack of Keep integration is a big miss in terms of helping you with your personal productivity. Google Docs is overkill for a packing list. Unfortunately, for iPhone users, it won’t be possible to tap the Gemini Spark directly from your device via a hardware button press or gesture — unless Apple announces it at WWDC next month? Instead, you’ll need to launch the Gemini app and use it from there. (Another issue is having Spark be its own toggle inside Gemini — you can’t program an iPhone’s activity button to go directly to Spark, and it’s separate from Gemini’s chatbot interface. How great it would be if everything Gemini does was all in one destination! Ah!)

And while Spark will later be able to do more through MCP integrations, the inability to set it up to perform certain tasks — like regularly booking your favorite nightly restaurant through Resy or searching for flight deals on your favorite booking engine, for example — makes Spark feel somewhat lacking for now, since not everything you do online happens in the world of Google’s services.

(Also, I’d really like to text Spark. I wish that was an option too.)