Google is rolling out AI Mode - its new artificial intelligence (AI)-powered answer engine-style search experience - to all users in India just two weeks after launching it as an experiment, making it the first country outside the United States where the feature is being made widely available.
AI Mode is Google's bid to counter rivals such as Perplexity and OpenAI's ChatGPT, which have gained ground over the past couple of years amid an ongoing shift in how consumers seek information. The feature was first announced in March and was made available to all consumers in the United States in May.
Accessible through a dedicated tab on the Search results page, AI Mode allows users to ask longer, more complex and nuanced questions that would have previously required multiple searches. At Google I/O 2025 in May, CEO Sundar Pichai said that early testers asked queries that were often two to three times longer and sometimes even up to five times the length of traditional searches.
AI Mode will also be available through the search bar in the Google app in the coming days. "We have different entry points for people who are interested in AI-forward content...For others who might want to choose when they want, there's the AI Mode chip, which you can access at any time," Hema Budaraju, Vice President of product management for search at Google told Moneycontrol in an interview.
Aside of typing out the query, people can also speak, or snap a photo with Lens to receive a rich, in-depth response with links and explore further through follow-up questions.
"We know that voice and visual search are extremely popular in India. In fact, most people use Google Lens in India every month than in any country worldwide," she said.
Budaraju added that the response for the feature has been "encouraging, with people appreciating the speed, quality, and freshness of AI Mode."
"We’ve seen users putting it to work in diverse ways - from diving deep into topics for learning to understanding complex how-tos," she said.
"This is pretty inspiring for us too, because we actually learn from the Indian users in so many ways. I find it really compelling to see the blend where people can ask any question in any way, combining voice and visuals effortlessly, using the camera and engaging live (with the real world)," Budaraju said.
How Does it Work?
AI Mode combines advanced capabilities of Google’s AI models with access to information systems, including real-time sources such as the Knowledge Graph, real-world data, and shopping information for billions of products.
It uses a technique called "query fan-out," which breaks down a question into different subtopics and concurrently searches on each of them across multiple data sources. The results are then brought together into a single, easy-to-understand response.
The feature is powered by a custom version of Gemini 2.5 and builds on Google's AI-powered search experience, AI Overviews, introduced last year. AI Overviews provides a quick summary of a topic along with links to go deeper. These efforts are part of Google's push to reinvent its flagship Search product for the AI era.
Read: Google I/O 2025 was a litmus test. Did Sundar Pichai deliver?
Deep Search & AI Agents Next
In May, during Google I/O 2025, the company announced that AI Mode will offer advanced capabilities such as Deep Search that can issue hundreds of searches, reason across disparate pieces of information, and create an expert-level fully cited report in minutes in the future.
AI Mode will analyse complex data sets and create interactive charts for that specific query, starting with finance and sports queries, the company said. It’s worth noting that Perplexity has also rolled out similar experiences for finance and sports queries in recent months.
Google also plans to bring AI agent capabilities from its research prototype Project Mariner into AI Mode, to help users with event tickets, restaurant reservations and local appointments.
Among other forthcoming features include Search Live, which brings Project Astra’s live capabilities into Search. It will enable people to talk back-and-forth with Google Search about what they see in real-time, using their camera.
Consumers will soon receive more personalised suggestions based on their past searches. One can also opt in to connect their accounts across Google's apps, like Gmail, to receive more personalised search recommendations in AI Mode.
The new AI Mode shopping experience brings together Gemini model capabilities with the company’s Shopping Graph to help users browse through suggestions and narrow down products based on their preferences.
People can also upload an image to virtually try on apparel listings, and use the new agentic checkout feature to help purchase on their behalf using Google Pay. These features will be available through Google's Search Labs initiative later this year.
Rival OpenAI too started offering product recommendations in ChatGPT in April as part of its efforts to improve shopping experience. Their recommendations offer visual product details, pricing, and reviews along with a direct link to buy the item.
Focus on Quality
AI’s growing role in search is also driving higher expectations for precise and trustworthy results, especially after the rocky rollout of Google’s AI Overviews, which sparked controversy last year by delivering several bizarre and inaccurate results that quickly went viral.
"The top priority for us in Search is upholding the high bar for quality and trust. AI Mode is rooted in the core search quality and safety systems, which includes all the goodness that we have on quality, spam controls, and safety that we can continue to build on. As we see more usage, our commitment is to ensure that the high bar for quality and trust remains the same," Hema Budaraju said.
The launch of AI-powered search has also raised concerns among web publishers about a potential loss in traffic and revenue. Gartner, a research and consulting firm, predicts that traffic to the web from search engines will fall 25 percent by 2026.
Budaraju, however, said that Search "continues to drive billions of visits to websites" and that the company's priority is to "send traffic to the web."
"We believe this is fundamental to what users expect from Google, and it's a product direction that we are deeply dedicated to. We will continue to engage with the broader ecosystem as we introduce new AI experiences," she said.
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