Google on Thursday announced several new AI features for the Chrome browser. That includes new Google Lens functionality that works just like the Circle to Search feature Google brought to smartphones this year.
Google unveiled Circle to Search in early January as an exclusive feature for Pixel 8 and Galaxy S24 phones. Since then, more Android phones have received it, including the new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Flip 6. With Circle to Search, you can invoke Google Assistant and perform an internet search by drawing a circle on the screen.
Circle to Search can be incredibly useful. It lets you search the web for anything on your display, whether images or text. You can even pause videos to search for something you saw in them.
Google Lens will now give you similar capabilities in Chrome, in the same way that you can use Circle to Search on iPhone. Instead of drawing a circle on the screen, you’ll have to press a new Lens icon in the address bar. You can also trigger it from a right-click menu or the three-dot menu.
After that, you have to drag the Lens icon over the part of the web page that you want to search. Google offers various examples in its blog post, including selecting a plant from a photo or a bag from a video. You can also select text, like math equations.
The Chrome browser will open a side panel on the right to show information about the element you selected. You can also type additional questions about your selection since Google Lens supports multimodal search. That is, it lets you combine your image with a text prompt.
The feature might get you an AI Overview with additional information in the US. Hopefully, you’ll never have to experience AI Overviews since they’re still a big mess much of the time.
This Circle to Search-like feature isn’t Google’s only AI novelty that’s being added to Chrome.
A new “Tab compare” feature will let you use AI to compare similar products you might research in different windows. Tab compare will pull information from all these tabs into one tab, making comparing the products easier. The AI will generate information from the tabs you have open, as seen in the example above.
AI will also let you find websites from your browsing history by entering a text prompt. This will be a lot easier than trying to remember a specific webpage. The feature is similar to Microsoft’s proposed Recall feature for Windows 11 but less creepy. However, your prompts might be sent to Google, complete with page contents. So you’ll want to handle it with care.
This Google Lens upgrade will roll out to Chrome in the next few days. Tab compare and AI history search will be available in the coming weeks, starting in the US.
