☰
Research & searchFree tier with limits

NotebookLM

Google's research notebook (now shown as Gemini Notebook) that answers questions from the sources you upload.

Official site: notebooklm.google.com ↗

Is it actually free? Free tier with limits

Standard (free) plan: standard limits for chat and generating Slides, Audio Overviews and other artifacts, up to 50 sources per notebook.

Pricing

Free; higher limits come with Google AI Plus, Pro and Ultra subscriptions (see Gemini pricing).

Best for

Studying or summarizing your own documents, with answers tied to those documents.

Not great for

General web questions: it works from the sources you add.

Alternatives

Research & searchFree tier with limits

Perplexity

An AI answer engine that searches the web and cites its sources.

Free? Free plan: use the automatic 'Best' model in Search plus a limited number of Pro Searches; you cannot pick advanced models manually.

Research & searchFree tier with limits

Elicit

An AI research assistant that searches and summarizes academic papers.

Free? Basic (free): unlimited search across 138M+ papers, unlimited summaries and chat with papers; limited Research Agent and Research Reports use.

AssistantsFree tier with limits

Gemini

Google's AI assistant, built into the Gemini app and Google's apps.

Free? Free ($0 with a Google Account): Gemini app with a Flash-Lite model, image generation and editing, Deep Research, Gemini Live, Canvas and Gems. Paid p…

Last checked 2026-10-13 · Source: notebooklm.google pricing ↗ · How we verify · Report an error