Google [NASDAQ: GOOGL] has officially released its Gemini 2.0 artificial intelligence model suite to the public as of Wednesday. This widespread availability marks a significant step in Google’s push towards advanced AI agents, making its “most capable” AI models accessible to a broader audience.
The move follows an earlier release in December, during which Google provided access to select developers and testers and integrated some functionalities into existing Google products. However, this latest announcement signifies a full-scale general release, according to the company.
The Model Suite includes Gemini 2.0 Flash, a robust model created for handling high-volume and high-frequency tasks. Gemini 2.0 Pro Experimental focuses on providing advanced coding capabilities. Finally, Gemini 2.0 Flash-Lite is presented as the most cost-effective model within the suite.
Gemini Flash offers developers a pricing structure of $0.10 per million tokens for processing text, image, and video inputs. For a more cost-effective alternative, Gemini Flash-Lite is available at just three quarters of a cent ($0.0075) per million tokens. In this context, tokens are defined as the individual units of data that the model analyzes and processes.
This initiative is part of Google’s broader strategy to heavily invest in AI agents, amid increasing competition among major technology firms and startups. Companies such as Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Anthropic are also advancing towards developing agentic AI. These AI agents are designed to autonomously handle intricate, multi-step tasks, reducing the need for users to guide them through each individual action.
Google has been focused on creating agentic models that can understand their environment, predict future steps, and act on behalf of users under their supervision. Gemini 2.0 includes advancements in multimodality, such as native image and audio output, and integrated tool usage. The aim is to facilitate the creation of new AI agents, bringing Google closer to its vision of a universal assistant.
Google faces stiff competition from companies like Anthropic and OpenAI. Anthropic, backed by Amazon, has developed AI agents capable of using computers to complete complex tasks, interpreting screen content, selecting buttons, entering text, navigating websites, and executing tasks through various software and real-time internet browsing. OpenAI recently released Operator, a similar feature designed to automate tasks such as planning vacations and making reservations. Google also launched Deep Research, an AI tool that acts as a research assistant, exploring complex topics and compiling reports.
