Even though Gemini is incredibly intelligent and can do everything from assist you with holiday planning to provide real-time information through Project Astra, the switch from Google Assistant to Gemini on Android hasn’t been simple. Basic features like asking Gemini to play music, establish reminders, and read news were absent when Google originally made the switch. However, as Google has begun to make the YouTube Music Gemini Extension available to the general public, some of these features are making a comeback.

Since we expected YouTube Music’s integration with Gemini when it initially surfaced ahead of I/O 2024, this isn’t very new. You can now use the extension as it is now formally available. It must be enabled, though, by going to gemini.google.com/extensions or by asking Gemini to play music on your Android device. Either way, this method seems to work for me in getting the pop-up to appear.

You should be aware that this extension only currently supports the English language and that enabling it will give Gemini access to your playlists, listening history, and preferences. You also need to make sure that your YouTube Music and Gemini Google accounts are the same in order to use this extension.

With Gemini’s YouTube Music extension, what are your options?

After Gemini is enabled, you can ask it to “Play [song]” or “Play [artist]” on your phone, and YouTube Music will begin to play the requested song. The request to play music does, however, offer a useful card link to YouTube Music, but it can cause an error on the web temporarily.

Google also claims that users can provide complex directions such as “Play music that I like,” “Find the song that goes with [song lyrics],” and “Search for songs similar to [song name] by [artist name],” among others. You can also utilize other conversational requests, such as “Play some rock music” and “Switch to white noise on @YouTubeMusic.” An extensive list of sample prompts that you can use with Gemini has been published by Google.