Google Search: The AI Platform with Agents and Mini-Apps

At its developer conference I/O, Google announced a comprehensive reorientation of its search engine. The focus is on a completely revamped search box, which Google describes as the biggest upgrade in 25 years: it expands dynamically, suggests AI-powered reformulations, and accepts images, videos, and Chrome tabs as input in addition to text. Gemini 3.5 Flash replaces the previous predecessor as the default model in AI Mode.

Also new are so-called Search Agents: Information agents running in the background are intended to monitor the web, news, social media, and real-time data on finance and sports around the clock and proactively notify users – for example, if a housing advertisement matches their criteria. The feature will launch "in the summer" initially for paying Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers.

Expanded agentic booking functions complement the package. The new search is intended to handle bookings starting in the summer and even make calls to companies itself in certain categories such as crafts or beauty, though initially only in the USA. A „Universal Cart“ will be used – a cross-merchant AI shopping cart for Search, Gemini, YouTube, and Gmail.

Furthermore, Google is bringing its Antigravity technology to search: in combination with the coding capabilities of Gemini 3.5 Flash, Search on-the-fly is intended to generate individual surfaces – from interactive visualizations to tables to mini-apps for all kinds of tasks, such as wedding planning or moving organization. This function is to be available "in the coming months" initially only for Pro and Ultra users in the USA.

Personal Intelligence, Google's function for connecting personal apps like Gmail and Google Photos, is being expanded by Google to almost 200 countries and 98 languages, without a subscription requirement.

From signpost to platform

One year after the launch of AI Mode, Google reports one billion monthly users; the number of requests has doubled quarterly since launch.

For alternative search engines such as Kagi, Brave Search, or Mojeek, the innovations are likely to increase the pressure. Google demonstrates that it can leverage its data advantage – billions of search queries daily, plus Gmail, Calendar, and Google Photos – directly into personalized AI experiences that independent providers can hardly replicate structurally. Those who do not have their own user base of this magnitude cannot offer Personal Intelligence in comparable depth.

Publishers and media houses face a sharpened dilemma. If search in the future not only summarizes results but also continuously reads in the background via information agents, evaluates content, and notifies users directly, the incentive to click on a website at all decreases. The model that supports journalism and many other content providers – advertising revenue from page views – is further eroded.

In e-commerce, the combination of agentic booking and search agents could redefine platform dependency. Those who have so far relied on Amazon or booking.com as intermediaries will now have another powerful gatekeeper in Google. And it not only compares prices but also completes the purchase itself. For small retailers and service providers, this means: their visibility will depend even more on whether and how well their data is integrated into Google's ecosystem.

(jo)