Turn a work pile into a NotebookLM brief

NotebookLM answers from the files you put in one notebook. Google's Help Center documents the same app as Gemini Notebook. Add the pile as sources, then ask for a brief. An Audio Overview is optional, and it is built from those sources.

Google's documentation states the limit that decides how you split the work: "Each notebook is independent. Gemini Notebook can't access information across multiple notebooks at the same time." Open the app at notebook.google.com. Google's FAQ says to verify your age in the Google Account before you can get in. A work or school account also needs an admin to turn the app on.

Upload the pile as sources

A source is a copy, or a Drive file that keeps syncing, inside the notebook. The add-sources page is the spec. On a computer, open Gemini Notebook, or Notebooks in Gemini. Open a notebook you own, or create one. On the left, select Add sources.

What you can put in, from that same page:

• Local files: Word, text, Markdown, PDF, CSV, and PowerPoint. Pasted text works, and you can set the title when you paste it.
• Google Docs. Google Slides, up to 100 slides. Google Sheets, limited to 100k tokens. Drive imports need view access. They auto-update, and you can force a refresh with "Click to sync with Google Drive." Footnotes and comments on Google files are not imported. If you lose access to the Drive file, the source goes inactive. Inactive sources still count toward the cap, and chat will not cite them.
• A web URL. Only the text of that HTML page comes in. Images, embedded videos, and nested pages stay out. Paywalled pages are not supported. A PDF URL is treated as a PDF.
• A public YouTube URL that has captions, yours or auto-generated. Only the transcript is imported. Videos uploaded less than 72 hours prior may fail. Videos with no speech are rejected. There is no length cap unless the caption file passes 500,000 words. If the video is deleted or made private, the source is removed within 30 days.
• A local audio file. It is transcribed on import, and the text is what the notebook keeps. Files with no speech are rejected.

The file cap is 500,000 words per source, or 200 MB for a local upload, per Google's FAQ. That page says there is no page limit. A copy-protected PDF will not import. The add-sources page repeats the same word and size caps, and it says Free users can include up to 50 sources.

Notebook and source slots are the numbers the upgrade page actually prints. The first column matches the Free-user source cap on the add-sources page.

Plan on the upgrade page	Notebooks	Sources per notebook
Standard	100 per user	50
Google AI Plus	200 per user	100
Google AI Pro	500 per user	300
Google AI Ultra, 20 TB plan	500 per user	500
Google AI Ultra, 30 TB plan	500 per user	600

The upgrade page names Plus, Pro, and Ultra as the way to raise those caps, through a Google AI plan, Google Cloud, or a qualifying Workspace plan. It does not print a monthly price. Work and school accounts have a separate table on the work-or-school page. Those columns are not mixed into the table above. Sharing a notebook does not change the source limit for anyone on it.

Daily chat counts and daily Audio Overview counts are left off this page on purpose. The upgrade page still prints a per-day table. Manage your Gemini Notebook usage limits describes a different system, dated from September 2, 2026: a compute meter that weighs the prompt, the model, the feature, and how long the chat has run. The two pages do not agree, so neither number is repeated here. Open Settings, then Usage. The chat box prints how much you have left, and when it refreshes, for the account you are in.

Once five or more sources are in, the add-sources page says the notebook can auto-label them. You can rename a label, add one, or move a file. To keep a chat on part of the pile, select those sources in the Sources panel. Unselected files stay in the notebook and still count.

If the pile is missing a document, the same page offers Fast Research and Deep Research from the sources search box. Fast Research pulls web or Drive results you then choose. Deep Research can browse and return a report plus sources, and you import the ones you want. It is limited to users over 18. Source caps still apply, and the page says results may come in only partly if a usage limit is hit. Anything you import becomes a source in this notebook. It does not become visible to your other notebooks.

Ask chat for a briefing document

After the upload, the create-a-notebook page says the Chat panel shows a generated summary of the sources. You can ask a question, give an instruction, or pick a suggested prompt. The chat article adds that you choose which sources the model uses.

Citations are the check. The chat article says Gemini Notebook uses direct quotes, text, and images from your sources. Select a citation and the app opens that passage in the source. Google's FAQ says a very short source may be referenced as a whole document, with no individual quoted line.

"Chat responses in Gemini Notebook only use data from your sources."

The same tip gives the failure mode. A creative request, the example is "rewrite the end of my short story," can come back as "Gemini Notebook can't answer this question." Rephrase, or ask something the sources can answer. If the fact is not in the pile, the overview page says the app is built to answer from the uploaded sources.

Further down, the chat article describes a second behavior. It says agentic features can take actions for you, including a web search, with or without sources, and it calls those functions experimental. The article does not say which accounts get that mode. Do not plan on web search inside a free account. If the missing page matters, the last section is the fork.

Configure Chat sits in the Chat panel at notebook.google.com. The styles are Default, Learning Guide, and Custom. Default is the one the page recommends for general research. Learning Guide is aimed at teaching. Custom takes a style or a role. Pick a response length and save. For a work brief, use Default. A custom persona does not relax the source rule.

Ask for a briefing document in the chat box. On each item the sources support, ask for the decision and the owner. Ask for the date or deadline when a source states one, and for the open question the pile does not settle. Ask for a citation on the line. The add-sources page says a specific question helps when many files are selected, and that naming the source in the question narrows the search. Their example asks for key findings in a document titled Dog Training 101. Use the real filenames in your pile the same way.

Studio can build the briefing document without you writing that prompt. The create-a-notebook page lists report types, and a briefing document is one of them. The three-dot menu on a report has Export to Docs. If that report contains data tables, Export to Sheets puts each table on its own tab. A data table you generate on its own exports with the table on the first tab and citations on the second. Edits in the exported Doc or Sheet do not synchronize back to the notebook. Sharing permissions do not carry over either.

Save to note pins a chat answer on the noteboard and keeps tables and the inline citations. Chat history stays private to you. The three-dot menu in the chat panel can delete it. The overview page says your data is not used to train Gemini Notebook unless you send feedback, and that feedback can include the query, the uploads, and the response. Workspace and Workspace for Education accounts are the exception that page spells out: those uploads and responses are not reviewed by human reviewers and are not used to train models. The same page says not to rely on the app for medical, legal, or financial advice.

Generate the Audio Overview in Studio

Read the brief before you generate the audio.

"Audio Overviews are deep-dive discussions between AI hosts that provide in-depth summaries of the key topics in your uploaded sources. These overviews are designed to be an objective reflection of your source content, rather than subjective opinions from the AI hosts."

That passage is the opening of the Audio Overview page. You need edit access on the notebook to generate one or to delete one.

1. Open the notebook that already holds the pile.
2. In the Studio panel, select Audio Overview.
3. In the generation panel, set the format and the language. Add a focus prompt if you want the hosts on one part of the pile. Then let it run.

Generation happens in the background. The page says it may take a couple of minutes, and you can keep working or open another screen. The formats on that page:

• Deep Dive, the default. Two hosts connect topics from the sources.
• The Brief. One speaker, key takeaways, in under two minutes.
• The Critique. Two hosts, aimed at something like an essay or a design doc.
• The Debate. Two hosts, a formal back-and-forth.

Length is Shorter, Default, or Longer. Longer is marked English only. Output language covers 80+ languages, and the page says the default is the preferred language on your Google Account. The overview page states the same 80+ figure for the product as a whole.

The page says the prompt can focus the overview on specific topics, or change the expertise level. Name the files, the way the Dog Training 101 example does for chat. The page also says the audio, including the voices, is AI-generated and may contain inaccuracies or audio glitches. If a line sounds cleaner than the brief, open the citation in the source before you repeat it.

Interactive mode lets you join the hosts by voice. The page says it is currently available only in English, and only on a newly generated overview. Select Interactive mode, listen, then select Join. The hosts answer from your sources and then resume the original audio. Your voice and the transcript of that exchange are not stored or shared. Someone opening a share link cannot join the hosts themselves.

The page lets you download the audio, and it lets you copy a link to it. For the link, the notebook has to be shared with the recipient or made public, and viewers need the full notebook. Public sharing is disabled for Workspace Enterprise and for Education accounts. A Play Books ebook used as a source can block the download. Deleting the audio kills the old share link.

When you are out of AI limits, the usage page says you can delay a Studio generation with Generate later. That control is web-only. The page says it may take a couple of hours, and you get a notice if notifications are on. An artifact the app sometimes creates on its own, the first time sources are added, is generated once and does not count against the limit. That note is on the upgrade page.

Open Perplexity or ChatGPT when the pile is the wrong input

Stay in the notebook when the documents are already yours and the question is inside them. Leave when the next source is not in the pile, or when you need sentences the sources do not contain.

Perplexity is the web-research entry in this directory. Use it when you still have to find the page. NotebookLM's Fast Research and Deep Research can import web results into a notebook, and those imports then follow the source cap and the source-only chat rule. Import after you mean to keep the page. The side-by-side is Perplexity AI vs NotebookLM.

ChatGPT is the draft. The chat article's own example is a rewrite the notebook may refuse, because the response has to come from the sources. If the memo has to say something the pile never said, write it somewhere that is allowed to leave the documents. The experimental agentic mode on the chat article is not a reason to assume every account can do that inside NotebookLM. The article never names who gets it.

The job	Where it goes
The files are already yours, and the question is in them	NotebookLM. One notebook. Brief, then Audio Overview if you want to hear it.
You still need a source you do not have	Perplexity. Import into the notebook only after you mean to keep it.
You need writing the sources do not contain	ChatGPT. The notebook's chat tip is the refusal you should expect.

Open notebook.google.com and create the notebook. Add the pile before you ask for the brief. The directory note is /tools/notebooklm.