I Let Google's'Auto Browse' AI Agent Take Over Chrome. Auto Browse can shop for clothes, plan a trip, and buy tickets for you. So, while testing Google's new "Auto Browse" feature for Chrome, I was filled with a strange sense of loss as I watched the AI agent open browser tabs and attempt to complete digital tasks with automated clicks. Sure, I felt some loss of control as the bot tapped away on my laptop screen. But also a kind of preemptive nostalgia for how the internet currently works, flaws and all, considering Google's plans to fundamentally alter the user experience.

Google's latest addition to its Chrome browser puts generative AI behind the wheel and you in the passenger seat. Google debuted a new "Auto Browse" feature for Chrome on Wednesday. The tool, powered by Google's current Gemini 3 generative AI model, is an AI agent designed to take over your Chrome browser to help complete online tasks like booking flights, finding apartments, and filing expenses. The release of Auto Browse is part of Google's continued integration of AI features into Chrome. Last year, Google dropped the "Gemini in Chrome" mode to answer questions about what's on web pages and synthesize details from multiple open tabs.

Google Chrome is launching agentic AI "autobrowsing" that automates web tasks like form filling, reservations, and license renewals for paid Google AI subscribers. PCWorld reports that a new Gemini AI sidebar will be available to all Chrome users, accessing personal data from Gmail and other apps.

Chrome for Android now uses Google Gemini to convert webpages into podcast-style summaries with virtual hosts for hands-free browsing during commutes.

Google Chrome now offers enhanced autofill for passports, driver's licenses and vehicle registration, joining existing options for passwords and payment details.

OpenAI's Atlas Wants to Be the Web's Tour Guide. In OpenAI's new Atlas browser, the Ask ChatGPT sidebar is moderately helpful at best. OpenAI's recently launched Atlas browser is a fascinating inversion of what users may expect from a browser, centering AI answers above traditional web links. Every click in a regular browser is a chance to see a new part of the web. Every click in Atlas is a chance to use ChatGPT .

Google weaving Gemini further into the popular Chrome browser is an inflection point for AI in our software, although some users will still be looking for the "off" switch. Google is adding multiple new AI features to Chrome, the most popular browser in the world. The most visible change is a new button in Chrome that launches the Gemini chatbot, but there are also new tools for searching, researching, and answering questions with AI. Google has additional cursor-controlling "agentic" tools in the pipeline for Chrome as well. The Gemini in Chrome mode for the web browser uses generative AI to answer questions about content on a page and synthesize information across multiple open tabs.

When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. It really looks like the Google Chrome omnibox will eventually be used for web addresses, searches, and Gemini prompts. Google is tying Gemini and Chrome closer together, allowing Gemini broader access to your Chrome tabs while quietly turning the address bar into an entry point for its AI Mode. Eventually, it'll add agentic browsing to Chrome as well. The latter point is likely what Google wants to signal to the broader market, since keeping pace with (or surpassing) other browser makers deploying agentic AI is seen as a leadership move.

A judge ruled on Tuesday that Google would not be forced to sell its Chrome browser or the Android operating system, saving the tech giant from the most severe penalties sought by the US government. The same judge had ruled in favor of US prosecutors nearly a year ago, finding that Google built and maintained an illegal monopoly with its namesake search engine. Groups critical of Google's dominance in the internet search and online advertising industry are furious. They contend the judge missed an opportunity to enact meaningful change in an industry that has suffocated under the crushing weight of its heaviest player. Tech industry groups and investors, by contrast, are thrilled. Shares in Alphabet, Google's parent company, have risen 9% since Tuesday afternoon.

For almost a year, the future of the world's most popular web browser has been a question mark. After the United States declared Google an illegal monopoly in online search, federal prosecutors put forth a forced divestment of Chrome as one possible legal remedy. The case is now resolved, pending appeal, and Google won't have to sell Chrome. Instead, Google will have to provide search index data and amalgamated user metrics to at least some of its competitors. Judge Amit Mehta ruled that the government prosecutors couldn't prove that Google's dominance in the browser space--just under 70 percent of market share, at the time of writing--was essential to its illegal monopoly in search, as Ars Technica reports.