Google’s New AI-First Colab Is Here: Smarter Coding Starts Now

After a month of early access testing, Google has rolled out its reimagined, AI-first Google Colab, which is now available to everyone starting today. First introduced at Google I/O 2025, the new Colab is built around Gemini and is designed to act as an intelligent coding partner right inside your notebook. It streamlines everything from data cleaning to visualization.
A Conversational Coding Assistant Inside Your Notebook
The updated Colab integrates deeply with Gemini to offer what Google calls “agentic capabilities.” It’s not just a chatbot layered on top of code. It helps with writing, fixing, transforming, and understanding code, as well as building and evaluating full machine-learning pipelines.
According to Google, users can now complete tasks that previously took hours in a fraction of the time just by conversing with the assistant.
One of the biggest pain points Colab AI wants to fix is debugging. When code breaks, the AI doesn’t just explain the issue; it offers suggested fixes with clear, different views, helping users learn as they go. It also allows you to describe code changes in plain English, and Colab will refactor the relevant sections automatically.
Visualizations with a Single Prompt
Earlier data scientists and analysts had to manage plotting libraries in the background, reducing the back-and-forth typically needed to tweak visuals manually. However, now they can generate clean, high-quality charts simply by asking the AI in natural language.
Imagen 4 Comes to Gemini API
Along with the Colab rollout, Google has also announced its latest text-to-image model, Imagen 4, to the Gemini API and Google AI Studio. This includes Imagen 4 Ultra, which is tuned for higher accuracy with text rendering inside images.
The new model is currently in paid preview, starting at $0.04 per image, with free usage limits in Google AI Studio. The Ultra variant, priced at $0.06 per image, is already seeing early adoption thanks to its improved prompt alignment and visual quality.
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