Gemini AI: Google's answer to ChatGPT

Of all the major AI providers, Google is the one most people in the Netherlands are already a customer of without realizing it. Gemini is in the search results, in the Google app on your phone and in Gmail and Drive. And if you pay Google every month for extra storage, there's a real chance an AI subscription is now attached to it as well.

Gemini is Google's AI assistant and the direct competitor of ChatGPT and Claude. This page explains which models are behind it, what the subscriptions cost in euros, why NotebookLM is the actual reason many people choose it, and where Gemini loses out to the rest.

Why you might already have Gemini

Google doesn't sell its AI as a separate product but as part of a subscription that also includes storage. Google AI Pro includes 2 TB of storage, Google AI Plus 200 GB. That's exactly the storage you used to buy separately.

The practical consequence: if you already pay for Google storage, it's worth checking your account settings to see exactly which plan you're on. If you're on a plan with AI, you're not using something you already pay for. And if you're still on a plan without AI, the step up to €7.99 per month is smaller than it looks, because you get 200 GB of storage with it instead of a bare AI subscription.

That makes Google the odd one out in the price comparison. With all the other providers you pay purely for the AI. With Google you pay for storage with AI thrown in, and that changes the math. What the other providers charge is listed in how much does an AI subscription cost.

Which Gemini models are there?

Behind the Gemini app are two models you'll come across in practice.

Gemini 3.5 Flash is the stable workhorse: fast, multimodal and broadly usable. Multimodal means it can handle text, images and documents in the same conversation — you can upload a photo of a form and ask questions about it right away.

Gemini 3.1 Pro is the heavier model you get in Google AI Plus and Pro, and it's still listed as a preview. Preview means Google can still change or replace the model; so don't count on its behavior staying identical for months.

Both have a context window of roughly a million tokens. A token is a piece of a word — as a rule of thumb, a thousand tokens is about 750 words — and the context window is everything the model can keep in view at once: your question, the attachments and the earlier conversation. With Google, that context window is the core promise: you can throw in a complete annual report without cutting it up.

For images and video, Google has Nano Banana Pro and Veo 3.1. That makes Google, alongside OpenAI, the only provider that delivers text, images and video in one subscription; Claude, for example, only does text and code. The full overview per provider is in every AI model at a glance.

NotebookLM: the feature people stay for

If one feature sells the Google AI Pro subscription, it's NotebookLM. The idea is simple: you upload your own sources — lecture notes, contracts, reports, a stack of PDFs — and ask questions about them. Gemini then answers based only on that material and points to the passage the answer comes from.

That's a fundamentally different use than chatting. In a regular chat you ask the model what it knows and have to hope it's right. With NotebookLM you ask the model what's in your documents, and you can check the answer on the spot. For students, lawyers, researchers and anyone who works with case files, that's the difference between usable and not usable.

Google AI Pro adds Deep Research to that: research in which the model works through a series of sources on its own and writes a report on them.

How much do the Google AI subscriptions cost?

In the Netherlands, Google prices in euros including VAT. That saves hassle: the amount on the site is the amount on your statement, and it doesn't move with the dollar exchange rate the way it does with OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity.

At €7.99, Google AI Plus is the cheapest serious AI subscription on the Dutch market. For comparison: ChatGPT Plus and Claude Pro both come to €21.02 including VAT. If you want to know which of the three subscriptions around €21 gives you the most, we made that comparison in ChatGPT Plus vs Claude Pro vs Google AI Pro.

Where Gemini disappoints

Google has the best value for money of the big three, but there are three honest downsides.

The Dutch is correct but flat. In our assessment Gemini scores a 4 out of 5: good grammar, strong at translating, but the tone is businesslike and stays that way even when you ask for something else. Claude scores a 5 and delivers texts you can more often use unchanged. For a report or a summary that makes no difference, for a persuasive text or a personal email it does. The full score list is in which AI speaks the best Dutch.

You're buying an ecosystem, not a chat. A good share of Google AI Pro's value lies in the integration with Gmail and Drive and in those 2 TB of storage. If you don't work in a Google environment, you pay for parts you never use and are left with a chat model that's no better than the competition.

The top model is still a preview. Gemini 3.1 Pro is the model you're paying for, and it isn't listed as final yet. In practice it works fine, but you don't build a workflow on it that has to stay the same for months.

Who is Gemini the right choice for?

• You work a lot with documents, PDFs and research — then Google AI Pro is probably your best purchase, mainly because of NotebookLM.
• You're looking for the cheapest serious subscription — Google AI Plus at €7.99 is the cheapest way to use a top model.
• You already live in Gmail, Drive and Docs — the integration and the storage make the difference.
• You want the best-written Dutch texts — then look at Claude first.
• You use several models side by side — then the subscriptions pile up and bundling is cheaper.

Conclusion