‘Solve all diseases,’ you say?
‘Solve all diseases,’ you say?

This is Optimizer, a weekly newsletter sent from Verge senior reviewer Victoria Song that dissects and discusses the latest gizmos and potions that swear they’re going to change your life. This week’s issue is a special early edition tied to The Verge’s Google I/O coverage. You can expect our next issue at its usual time […]

Canva launches inside Google Gemini, completing its push to be the design layer for every major AI assistant
Canva launches inside Google Gemini, completing its push to be the design layer for every major AI assistant

Canva has spent the past year quietly embedding itself into every major AI assistant. First came Claude, then ChatGPT, then Microsoft Copilot. Now Google Gemini gets the same treatment, and the strategy is complete. The company launched its Connected A…

Google’s new tool will end the long wait for iOS apps to appear on your Android phone

Google’s Android Studio Migration Assistant can port iOS projects to native Android by converting features, assets, and interfaces through an agentic workflow.

Vibe coding is coming to your phone
Vibe coding is coming to your phone

“There’s an app for that” was the promise of the App Store from the very beginning. The app that will get your phone to do the thing you want it to? It’s just a few taps away. The tagline wasn’t strictly true – I’m still waiting for that one perfect grocery list app. Still, apps […]

You can now remix other people’s YouTube Shorts with AI
You can now remix other people’s YouTube Shorts with AI

Google announced a new YouTube Shorts Remix feature that lets users restyle clips or even insert themselves into other people’s videos using Gemini Omni. Now, at the bottom of a YouTube Short, when you click the remix icon, you’ll see an option to “reimagine” it. Here, you can prompt Gemini to turn a video into […]

Google Search’s AI evolution includes more ads
Google Search’s AI evolution includes more ads

Google’s AI-powered Search era apparently also extends to its ads. Now, when you look for a product in Search, Google’s Gemini AI model will surface relevant items and generate a “custom explainer” about why you should purchase a specific one. The update comes just one day after Google revealed a new Search box for larger, […]

It’s make or break time for AI labeling systems
It’s make or break time for AI labeling systems

We’re about to find out if the systems designed to make deepfakes and AI-generated content easy to spot are actually up to snuff. SynthID and C2PA Content Credentials, two distinct technologies for invisibly tagging image, video, and audio files with information about their origins, are getting their biggest expansion to date, and with it, the […]

If Google can’t make AI agents useful, maybe no one can
If Google can’t make AI agents useful, maybe no one can

For years, tech companies have promised AI will give everyone a capable personal assistant but delivered something more like a clueless intern. Over the past six months, that has started to change, thanks largely to the viral open-source AI agent platform OpenClaw. And among the top AI labs now chasing similar success, one seems particularly […]

Google wants Gemini to help build the next big scientific breakthrough

Google’s Gemini for Science pushes AI beyond research summaries, with experimental tools for hypotheses, computational testing, and literature review. The bigger question is whether it can earn trust inside real labs.

Android 17 is getting its own version of Apple’s Handoff
Android 17 is getting its own version of Apple’s Handoff

Google is adding a new Android feature that resembles Apple’s Handoff, allowing you to start a task on your Android phone and continue it right where you left off from a compatible tablet. “Continue On” is designed to eventually be bidirectional, but Google says that at launch it will only support tasks moving from a […]