Earlier this year, we introduced a new comments experience in Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides on web. Today, we’re announcing a similar update to Android tablets for viewing, navigating, and replying to comments, especially on-the-go. In addition to improved design and filtering functionality to match the web experience, you’ll now be able to easily: 

Keep a pulse on the latest updates: now you’ll see the first comment and the two most recent replies from a comment thread, with the option to show all comments within a discussion.Review comments with full context: enjoy familiar, in-context commenting, similar to the web experience, while taking advantage of larger screen real estate on tablets. Navigate and filter comments: navigation tabs and filters within the comments panel help you easily find relevant comments, without having to switch to a separate view.

Getting started 

Rollout pace 

Availability 

Resources 

We’re excited to announce Gemini in Google Chat can now help you catch up on unread conversations in the Chat home view with summaries. 

Upon navigating to an unread conversation in home, click the “Summarize” button to see a quick, bulleted synopsis of the message content. This enables you to quickly review recent activity across all active conversations to determine where best to focus your time and attention. 

End users 

Since introducing a more streamlined user experience in Chat to help you find what you need much faster, we’re adding more ways to help you prioritize the most important conversations. This new summaries in home feature does just that by helping you catch up more quickly. 

Summaries in the home view are available for any group conversation, space, or thread in home that contain unread messages. 

Admins: To access summaries in home, users need to have smart features and personalization turned on. Admins can turn on default personalization setting for their users in the Admin console. End users: You can turn this feature ON/OFF by turning Smart features & controls in Google products ON/OFF. To see summaries on web, hover over an unread group conversation, space, or thread from home in Chat and click “Summarize.” To see summaries on mobile, long press on an unread group conversation, space, or thread from home in Chat. Visit the Help Center to learn more about summaries in home.

Web,  Android & iOS:

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on October 21, 2024 

Available for Google Workspace customers with these add-ons:

Gemini Business, Enterprise, Education, Education Premium AI Meetings & Messaging 

Pronouns are now displayed in Google Meet

Previous announcements

We have paused the rollout for this feature while we evaluate performance and quality. We will provide an update with new rollout information as soon as possible.

Getting started

Rollout pace

Availability

Resources

In March 2024, we launched an open beta for the ability to migrate your users’ email data from Google Workspace, Gmail, or IMAP enabled mail servers to another Google Workspace account. This includes the ability to run delta migrations, to smartly bring over newly generated or modified emails from the source without duplicating previously migrated content. 

Beginning today, this data migration experience is now generally available, helping admins migrate email data in a more secure, reliable, and efficient manner.

Additional details

Getting started

Earlier this year, we launched Google Drive inventory reporting in beta — beginning today, this feature is generally available. Compared to APIs, exporting inventory reports to BigQuery empowers admins to understand their data more deeply, providing insights into how their data is classified, accessed, and used. Understanding these metrics can help admins to identify security risks, ensure compliance with regulatory requirements, and more. For more information, please reference our original announcement. 

Alongside general availability, we’re pleased to announce new functionality: 

When generated, inventory reports will follow the data regions settings established by admins. Within reports, you can now view the email address of the file creator, what organizational unit the file owner belongs to, and inherited permissions for shared drive items. For greater admin visibility into inventory reporting related actions, audit events are now captured for configuration updates, configuration deletion & creation, as well as completed and failed reports.

Last year, we introduced the ability for teachers to mark an assignment for a particular student as “excused” instead of giving it a 0-100 score. We also added the ability to manually mark an assignment as “missing” or “complete” and automatically add a default draft score. 

These updates give teachers even more flexibility when it comes to grading for assignments and classwork, and today we’re excited to announce that teachers can include missing and excused grades when exporting grades to their Student Information Systems (SIS). 

• Admins: Once an admin establishes a connection between their SIS and Google Classroom, teachers can include missing and excused grades when they export grades from Classroom to their SIS. Visit the Help Center to learn more about connecting your Classroom to your SIS. 
• End users: If your admin has connected to your SIS, you can export missing or excused grades by going to classroom.google.com > select the class > “Grades” > “SIS export.” Visit the Help Center to learn more about using Classroom with your SIS, exporting grades to your Student Information System (SIS) gradebook. 

• Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility) starting on October 29, 2024 

Available for Google Workspace:

• Education Plus and the Teaching & Learning Upgrade 

• Google Help: Connect Classroom to your Student Information System (SIS) 
• Google Help: Export grades to your Student Information System (SIS) gradebook 
• Google Help: FAQ for Student Information System (SIS) integration for teachers 
• Google Help: FAQ for Student Information System (SIS) integration for admins 
• Google Help: Get started with Student Information System (SIS) roster import

To give users more control over how they see information in Google Chat, we’re introducing a new setting that allows you to control the visual density of screen elements. Choose between “Comfortable” or “Compact” on chat.google.com. 

• Comfortable mode, the default setting, reflects Chat’s modernized design, in line with Google Material Design 3, and clearly differentiates message bubbles.
• Compact mode is for users who prefer to see more information at a time with less scrolling. With this option, you’ll notice: 
• Message bubbles that are aligned in the same direction for both sender and recipient 
• Wider message bubbles 
• Padding in the left bar, conversation list, and home. 

• Admins: There is no admin control for this feature. 
• End users: 
• To modify density settings, go to chat.google.com > Settings > Density > Compact. Users can revert this to the default at any time by going to chat.google.com > Settings > Density > Comfortable. 
• Those who use Compact density setting in Gmail will also see Chat in Gmail in compact mode. Users can adjust their Gmail and Chat-in-Gmail density settings by going to Gmail > Settings > Density. 
• Visit the Help Center to learn more about using Compact mode in Google Chat.

• Rapid Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on October 30, 2024 
• Scheduled Release domains: Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility) starting on December 2, 2024 

• Available to all Google Workspace customers, Workspace Individual Subscribers, and users with personal Google accounts on web

• Google Help: Get started with Google Chat 
• Google Help: Use Compact mode in Google Chat

Beginning today, you can upload reference documents, including Google Docs and Google Sheets via Google Drive, when creating Gems. By adding reference documents to your Gems instructions you can further tailor Gems to meet your specific needs. 

These file types include: 

• Document and text files, such as TXT, DOC, DOCX, PDF, RTF, DOT, DOTX, HWP, HWPX and Google Docs 
• Data Files, such as XLS, XLSX, CSV, TSV and Google Sheets

In September, we introduced a feature through the Google Workspace Developer Preview Program that enables developers to create group chats in import mode using the spaces.create method when migrating to Google Chat from other messaging platforms. This week, we’re excited to announce that this is now generally available for Google Workspace developers. | Roll out to Rapid Release domains and Scheduled Release domains is complete. | Available to all Google Workspace customers. | Learn more about import mode. 

Currently, users can define saved queries in BigQuery Studio and notebooks, but they cannot reuse those queries in Connected Sheets without copy/pasting them. This week, we’re excited to announce that users can now search for and reuse pre-defined queries directly from BigQuery to load Connected Sheets data. To do so, go to Connection Settings > Edit connection > Saved queries and query editor and search for your query by project. | Rolling out now to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains at an extended rollout pace (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility), with expectation completion by December 6, 2024. | Available to all Google Workspace customers, Workspace Individual Subscribers, and users with personal Google accounts. | Visit the Help Center to learn more about writing & editing a query and getting started with BigQuery data in Google Sheets. 

Launching to beta: Import sensitive Microsoft Word documents as client-side encrypted Google Docs. 

Beginning this week, eligible customers can import and convert sensitive Microsoft Word files into Google Docs with client-side encryption. When collaborating with external and internal stakeholders, you may find yourself working across both Google Docs and Microsoft Word. This update keeps your work moving by layering interoperability on top of the confidentiality benefits of client-side encryption: customers are in direct control of their encryption keys and the identity service that they choose to authenticate for those keys. Eligible Google Workspace admins can use this form to request access to the beta. | Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Plus, Education Plus, and Education Standard customers. | Visit the Help Center to learn more about client-side encryption. More specific instructions will be shared once you’re accepted into the beta. 

Admins can now apply the following Google Chat settings at the group level: 

• Third-party archiving 
• Chat file sharing 
• Chat apps (allow users to install Chat apps) 
• Allowing the GIF picker in Chat 
• Auto deletion for 1:1 messages, group messages, and spaces 
• History for chats 

While these settings can also be configured at the Organizational Unit (OU) level, this update provides more granular control for admins. This is critical for our customers, who frequently request more flexibility in how they apply settings, giving them more flexibility on how to configure settings based on the various needs of their users. | Roll out to Rapid Release domains and Scheduled Release domains is complete. | Available to all Google Workspace customers.

Previous announcements

We have paused the rollout for this feature while we evaluate performance and quality. We will provide an update with new rollout information as soon as possible.