Earlier this week, we reported that it looked like Google Gemini was coming to iPhone and iPad. Well, we were on the money, as the standalone AI app is now available in the App Store, giving you the chance to check out Google’s wildly impressive AI chatbot.
Admittedly, the arrival of the Google Gemini app on iPhone has come as a bit of a shock, considering Apple has its own AI chatbot plans with the upcoming ChatGPT-enhanced Siri update. Worse still for Apple’s AI rollout, its most hyped Apple Intelligence tools, including the big changes to Siri, are only coming to the best iPads and iPhones – specifically, those equipped with 2024 chipsets like the new iPhone 16 and the iPad Air (M2). On the other hand, the Google Gemini app runs on older Apple devices with no issues. In fact, I loaded it up on an iPhone 13 and had no problems whatsoever.
If you want to try the Google Gemini app yourself, just head over to the App Store and search for it. That’s if you don’t see it on your homepage first, with the app already breaking into the top five most downloaded, even beating out Google Chrome and Prime Video. Once you grab the app, you can type out a query to ask Gemini or press the button in the bottom right-hand corner to try Gemini Live, Google’s conversational AI tool.
There are some limitations to the iPhone’s version of Google Gemini, though. While it can interact with other Google apps, like Chrome and Maps, that’s as far as it goes. This could be a silver lining for Apple’s intentions with the next big Siri update, as that’ll be able to interact with more apps in a more meaningful way. Honestly, I’ll use whichever can take my Uber Eats order without me opening the app, giving me more precious time to play my favorite Apple Arcade games.
We’ll have to wait until next year’s iOS 18.2 update to find out whether users prefer AI-powered Siri or Google Gemini, but either way, we’re only expecting more artificial intelligence features for iPhone in the coming months. If you can’t wait that long, be sure to check out our picks for the best Samsung phones and the best Google Pixel phones, many of which come with a suite of AI tools to make your life a little bit easier.