Gemini

Gemini is Google's AI assistant, at gemini.google.com, in the Android and iPhone apps, and since 2026 in desktop apps for Mac and Windows. Its main advantage for a shliach is that it already lives where your Chabad House's email, files and calendar live, if those are on Google.

No model in the group has swung further in reputation. Gemini was the group's favorite in late 2025, slipped in the spring, and by August 2026 the group admin's advice was "get off Gemini, it has fallen so far behind." On October 13, 2026 Google released Gemini 4 Argon, its first new top model in months. The group has barely tried it yet.

Plans and prices (US, checked October 2026)

Plan	Price	What it adds
Free	$0	Gemini app on the Flash-Lite model, image generation, Deep Research, Gemini Live, Canvas, Gems/skills, Gemini Notebook, 15 GB storage
Google AI Plus	$4.99/month	Flash model, 2x Free usage, Gemini in Gmail and Vids, 400 GB storage
Google AI Pro	$19.99/month	Gemini 4 Argon, the Pro model (3.1 Pro), 4x Free usage, Gemini in Gmail, Docs and Sheets, Gemini in Chrome, Gemini Spark (US), 5 TB storage
Google AI Ultra	$99.99 or $199.99/month	5x or 20x Pro usage, first access to new features, 20 TB storage and up

Source: gemini.google/subscriptions. Prices differ by country.

The old "$6 Gemini Plus" price that circulated in the group in November 2025 is out of date; AI Plus is $4.99 in the US.

The storage is part of the deal. A shliach in October 2025 said the 2 TB that came with his plan at the time "is what makes it difficult to cancel."

Students: eligible US college students can get a free year of Google AI Pro if they redeem by December 31, 2026 (Gemini release notes, August 19, 2026).

Nonprofits: see the Workspace section below.

Current models (October 21, 2026)

• Gemini 4 Argon (October 13, 2026). Google's new top model, for long and complex jobs. Pro and Ultra subscribers only.
• Gemini 3.1 Pro (February 19, 2026). Still the "Pro" model in the picker.
• Gemini 3.6 Flash (July 21, 2026). The fast everyday model, which replaced 3.5 Flash (May 2026). Google's plan page now lists Flash for AI Plus and up, and a lighter Flash-Lite model for the free plan.

The group's advice since January 2026: when accuracy matters, pick the Pro model (now Argon), not Flash. Members found the Flash models quick but more likely to invent things.

Surfaces worth knowing

• Gemini app on web, Android and iPhone.
• Gemini for desktop. A Mac app (April 2026) and a Windows app (September 10, 2026, Windows 10 or later). Press Alt + Space on Windows to call it up over whatever you are working on. Download at gemini.google/desktop.
• Customize (October 13, 2026). One menu, on every plan, to set how Gemini answers, add skills, and connect apps (over 40, most of them US-only). Find it in the left menu.
• Skills replacing Gems. Since September 30, 2026, skills are saved sets of instructions Gemini runs when your prompt matches, and you can stack two (say, your writing style plus your Chabad House's brand rules). Google says Gems will be retired and migrated into skills automatically.
• Gemini in Gmail, Docs and Sheets. Includes the =AI() formula in Sheets (also typed =Gemini()), which fills a column by running a prompt on each row. It handles up to 350 cells per run, needs an eligible Workspace or Google AI plan, and only sees the cells you pass it (Google's help page).
• Gemini Notebook, the new name for NotebookLM since July 2026. Notebooks now sync with the Gemini app.
• Google AI Studio, the free developer playground.
• Nano Banana, Google's image model, inside Gemini.

Gemini Spark and Gemini Omni

Both were announced at Google I/O on May 19, 2026, and both are real products now.

• Gemini Spark is Google's 24/7 agent: it works on tasks for you across Gmail, Docs, Drive and Sheets, on a schedule or on its own. It started with US AI Ultra subscribers, reached the Mac app on June 30, and rolled out to US AI Pro subscribers from July 16, 2026. Google says it is not coming to the EU, UK, Switzerland or Nigeria for now. The group admin named Spark in October 2026 as one of the big companies' early answers to personal-agent apps, "but it's not there yet." See Personal AI Agents.
• Gemini Omni makes and edits video from text, photos and clips, "like Nano Banana for videos," in Google's words. It is open to all paid Google AI subscribers 18 and over. See Video Creation.

What shluchim use it for

• Searching a messy Drive. "Asking Gemini to find information in my drive has made my life so much easier" (January 2026). This is the clearest win.
• Calendar. Gemini can add and change Google Calendar events. By default it uses your personal calendar; name the shared one explicitly.
• Sichos translation. A member said Gemini Pro with a custom Gem and a style prompt makes very few errors on sichos (April 2026). Others found it looser, "more spoken English." Review every line. See Hebrew & Yiddish.
• Brainstorming. "The most out of the box brainstormer" (March 2026).
• Turning a support chat into an SOP. A shliach pasted a customer-support chat and got a step-by-step procedure (December 2025).
• Slide decks. In April 2026 members found Gemini's decks, exported to Google Slides, easier to edit than NotebookLM's.
• Reading aloud a document in a natural voice.
• Querying a notebook with Argon. An October 14, 2026 tip from a member, not yet tested by others: in the Gemini app, pick Argon with high thinking and attach your Gemini Notebook to the chat, for fuller answers than the notebook alone gives.

Google Workspace for Nonprofits

Google now includes the Gemini app and Gemini Notebook at no cost in Google Workspace for Nonprofits, for up to 2,000 users (Google for Nonprofits). The free tier is basic: a smaller context window, and limited Deep Research and image generation. Gemini inside Gmail, Docs and Sheets (the side panel, "Help me write") needs a paid edition, which nonprofits get at a large discount.

That matches what members saw in May 2026: the nonprofit account "doesn't integrate into email the same way" until you upgrade. Two more cautions from the same thread: on a Workspace account the admin can see all Gemini chats, and users cannot easily delete their own. A member asked in late 2025 whether upgrading a nonprofit Workspace just for Gemini would cost the pooled nonprofit storage; check your admin console before you switch editions. See Nonprofit Discounts and Privacy & Data.

What to watch out for

• Long chats lose the beginning. Members found Gemini silently drops earlier context in very long chats (April 2026), and that totaling donations across hundreds of Zelle and PayPal emails went wrong because it reads only part of the inbox.
• Invented download links. Gemini sometimes offers a file "download" that does not exist. Ask for the content as text or a copy-paste table instead. Attachments it makes do not persist; save them at once.
• Times and dates. It mis-converted a time zone twice for one member (June 2026). Set your time zone in personalization and double-check zmanim. See Zmanim and Hebrew Dates.
• Slowness. "My Gemini Pro is extremely slow" (October 2026).
• Picking the image tool. In February 2026 Gemini answered "I'm just a language model" to image requests for days until members selected the Create image tool by hand.
• Image edits. The group admin found in early 2026 that Gemini loses quality with each edit of the same picture, while ChatGPT holds it.

How the group's view changed

• October to December 2025: the group admin moved from ChatGPT to Gemini and was "very happy." Gemini 3 Pro (November 18, 2025) was called "really powerful for Chassidus research," able to hold an entire Torah Ohr in one chat.
• January 21, 2026: the admin changed his advice: ChatGPT for ads and image edits, Gemini only if Google integration matters, and always the Pro model.
• April 2026: "Gemini recently took a turn for the worse." Another member: "fear not, Gemini will come back."
• August to September 2026: "Get off Gemini, it has fallen so far behind."
• October 13, 2026: Gemini 4 Argon. Too early for a group verdict.

Each swing lasted a few months, which is why the group no longer names one permanent favorite. See Model Leapfrog.

Related

• Gemini Notebook (NotebookLM)
• Google AI Studio
• Nano Banana
• ChatGPT and Claude
• MCP and Connectors
• Toolbox