OpenAI held a massive launch event in December, during which it added several new features to ChatGPT. Canvas was one of the new ChatGPT features that people really seemed to like. Canvas lets you collaborate with AI better than before for tasks that require revisiting the same document and making iterative changes.
ChatGPT Canvas is perfect for coding and writing jobs. The new Canvas UI puts the content front and center. You can chat with the AI directly in the main window or continue to type your requests in a sidebar while following along in the main window. This UI update makes it much easier to work with the AI on a single document, as opposed to copying and pasting code or text into ChatGPT over and over. Canvas also reduces the amount of scrolling needed to move between various changes.
Several months later, Google is now ready to match OpenAI with its Canvas feature in Gemini.
Gemini Canvas will work just like ChatGPT Canvas. You’ll be able to collaborate with the AI on text and code generation. The same UI change described above is coming to Gemini. The Canvas window will take up most of the Gemini UI. You’ll talk to the AI in a sidebar, where you can continue to input text as you normally would.
A new Canvas button will be available in the composer (or the prompt bar). Tap it to start a new project, and the Gemini UI will transition to Canvas mode like ChatGPT.
If you generate text with the help of AI, Canvas will provide additional quick editing tools to help you manage your draft. Again, that’s similar to how ChatGPT Canvas works. Gemini will let you highlight a paragraph and then apply fast edits by pressing a button. You can tell the AI to make it more formal, concise, or professional.
The resulting document can be exported to Google Docs if you need to collaborate with people on the draft Gemini helped you create.
Canvas is probably even better for code generation. Canvas lets you deploy code and work with the AI on it. Like text, you can select parts of code and ask the AI to explain it. Google says Canvas is also great for students just learning to code. The company offers one such example in the images and videos it publishes to showcase Canvas.
What’s even better is that Canvas can let you generate and preview HTML/React code and other web app prototypes to see what your design looks like.
Canvas will be available globally for Gemini and Gemini Advanced users in all Gemini-supported languages. That’s great news for Gemini users who do not pay for the premium Advanced subscription. Canvas will work for free, though some limits will probably exist. The new feature starts rolling out on Tuesday, so it might take a while to see it hit your account.
