One of the big questions about the skills, which are essentially custom instructions for Gemini that can be invoked within a message, was whether they would be available to both free and paid users. Previously, you could only use skills with the Spark agent, and Spark is reserved for paid Gemini AI users.
But in an update shared on Wednesday, Google announced that Gemini skills will be available to any Gemini user over the age of 18 with a personal Google account.
Google added that skills will also be updated with features missing from Gems, such as the ability to share skills with other users. You can also add files from Google Drive and notebooks from Gemini Notebook.
Existing gems will be converted to skills automatically, Google confirmed, or you can do the conversion manually if you want.
Personal Gemini Gems will retire starting in November, Google said, while Gems created by commercial, enterprise, and nonprofit Google Workspace accounts will remain until March 2027. Gems for Workspace educational accounts won’t go away until June 2027.
Unlike Gems, which are essentially autonomous chatbots powered by Gemini with their own instructions and knowledge files, skills can be invoked within any Gemini chat session by typing “/”, and a skill can even be called within another skill, enabling powerful AI workflows.
