NotebookLM Review: Free AI Writing Assistant

I tested NotebookLM for you. And it’s clearly an AI tool that’s solving a problem that might interest everyone. It’s a free AI writing assistant and AI research assistant.

Here is a complete NotebookLM review. 

1. What’s NotebookLM?

NotebookLM is an AI tool by Google designed to help users organize, summarize, and synthesize information only from the sources they upload, such as website links, YouTube videos, files, or notes.

NotebookLM is the best AI tool for knowledge management. It combines preselected audio, videos or text into a cohesive output.

Then you can interact and get anything you want out of them.

2. Who developed NotebookLM?

NotebookLM is owned and operated by Google. It’s a personalized AI research assistant built on Google’s Gemini 1.5 AI model.

Google is obsessed with innovative solutions and has once again proven they understand the needs of today’s professionals by launching NotebookLM, an AI writing assistant and research assistant.

3. What makes NotebookLM different from other AI chatbots?

NotebookLM is different because it only works with the information you upload from the sources you provide, while other AI chatbots have access to the internet and public sources of information.

4. What can NotebookLM do?

NotebookLM Can:

• Generate automatic summaries from anything you upload.
• Easily find specific information from dense documents, videos, text, audio, or websites.
• Give you access to a chatbot that only responds based on the sources you provide and doesn’t make up information.
• Connects ideas from different materials into one. It gives a synthesis.
• Convert your materials into a podcast script.
• Generate voiceovers for your podcast scripts.
• Upload Zoom or Google Meet transcripts.
• Avoid information overload.

5. Who Is NotebookLM For?

NotebookLM helps most content writers, students, researchers, entrepreneurs, and podcasters.

6. What are NotebookLM features?

– Note Summarization

It makes long-form documents, videos, notes, or other uploads shorter.

– Debriefing Document

NotebookLM can turn information into a small document organized with headlines, summarizing all the main points.

– Intelligent Search

It searches for specific topics or questions within the content you upload. You can upload from many different sources and formats at once.

– Personalized ChatBot

The NotebookLM’s chatbot responds based on your content.

It gives precise and relevant answer about what you uploaded.

So prompt engineering and knowing what you need will help you get the most out of it, just like with other artificial intelligence tools.

NBLM can also provide creative input based on logical thinking from your materials.

For example after feeding it a book, “You can say ‘Here is my situation in real life. It’s not the same context but what should I do?’ or ask ‘What was the name of the character who said “ABL is a great blog?“‘

Okay you get it: the chatbot helps you interact with what you’ve uploaded. Use your creativity.

– Generate Podcast with NotebookLM Audio Overview

This feature interests many users.

From the content you uploaded NotebookLM can generate a podcast script and natural voice following the script.

The interjections, hesitation, smart silences and emotions in the voice make it sound so human. It’s already amazing and it will keep getting better over time.

The downside is that it takes many minutes to generate long conversations. I generated a 21-minute podcast in 5 minutes. It’s a long waiting time.

But the good news is that it’s free, and the quality is unbelievably good.

– NotebookLM Supports Multi-language

This AI tool can understand sources from different languages and answer in your preferred language. Only the podcast feature generates voices in English for now.

– Notebook Save Note

NotebookLM is a notebook as well. Makes sense right? You can take notes by clicking on the ‘add notes’ button and start writing.

You can save any passage from the chatbot to your note.

A creative way to use it is, after a long conversation with the chatbot, you can ask for an overall summary and then save it to your note.

This helps organize your notebook for quicker access later.

– Convert Note to a Source

You can select different notes you’ve saved and turn them into a standalone source of information.

Also, combining what you’ve saved is a good way to gather ideas from different notebooks.

– Suggested Questions

“Suggested questions appear in the “Notebook Guide,” which becomes available after you upload your first sources. As you engage with the tool and begin asking questions, NotebookLM will also suggest follow-up questions based on your previous questions and the sources you uploaded.” – Google 

– Notebook Knowledge Retrieval

It finds the exact source of information in a source.

I had read the Google article above before. When I opened it again, I didn’t want to read it twice. It felt overwhelming.

So, I added its link to NotebookLM and used it to retrieve all the information about the “suggested question features.” This is another use of NotebookLM.

It answers with numbers in the text. When you click on them, it shows you exactly where this is located in the original source. It’s a time and energy saver.

– Multiple Source Integration

NotebookLM allows users to upload a variety of sources, including PDFs, Google Docs, websites, YouTube videos, eBooks, audio files like podcasts, and even notes saved from NotebookLM that are turned into a source.

– NotebookLM Share Button

You can share access to a notebook with someone as a viewer or editor by using their email.

A notebook in NotebookLM is like a folder or a new conversation window. It’s a fresh working space.

In one account, you can have up to 100 notebooks for now.

– Generate FAQ

I’ve been thinking for quite some time about adding an FAQ section to my AI tools reviews. I really want to go through all the questions you might have.

Then I was quite surprised when I saw that NotebookLM can help with that too.

You add the usual YouTube link, website link, files or notes and it will generate the most relevant questions and the right answers from it.

With AI your creativity is the limit. You can imagine how you want to implement this in your own content writing and business.

7. NotebookLM Pricing Plan

One of the most common questions is: “Is NotebookLM free?"

Yes it’s entirely free for now. NotebookLM is in an experimental phase. Google has not yet announced pricing plans for NotebookLM.

Once it moves beyond beta I think they will announce premium plans, because it’s way too good to stay free, and AI tools are costly when they generate things like text or audio.

8. How to Sign Up for NotebookLM?

Here are the steps:

• Go to notebooklm.com
• Connect with your Gmail account by clicking “Try NotebookLM“
• Now you’re in. Click on “Create New” to create a new notebook page
• Congratulations! Now you can try everything we explained before.
• You can click on “Add Source” at the top left, then upload Google Drive files, website or YouTube links and paste text.

9. NotebookLM Alternatives

No AI tool is entirely new. They try to improve on what existing tools do, fill a gap in a problem that hasn’t been fully solved or by combining features from several tools.

NotebookLM doesn’t have a direct competitor, but it performs tasks close to some other tools.

The best alternatives to NotebookLM are Obsidian and Notion.

– Obsidian

Obsidian is an alternative to NotebookLM because it organizes notes offline, links them together, and supports AI-powered plugins to analyze your content.

The common point is that both are knowledge management tools that use AI to link your notebook information.

The difference is that Obsidian focuses on long-term organization, whereas NotebookLM is focused on research and deep analysis.

– Notion AI

Notion AI is another excellent alternative. Because Notion is also a notebook tool, but it focuses on organizing your content. Its AI can analyze everything you’ve written in it.

NotebookLM on the other hand is better for research and summarizing content. But isn’t as user-friendly for long-term organization.

10. The Negative Sides and Inconveniences of NotebookLM

No tool is perfect and here are NotebookLM limitations:

• The NotebookLM audio overview takes several minutes to generate.
• Every time you reload your conversation, you lose everything. You only keep what you save in your notes.
• It’s quite different in terms of usage. New users might need time to explore and understand it.
• If you’re wondering, “Can NotebookLM read handwriting?” the answer is currently no. This is a significant drawback, but it might change in the future.
• There are concerns about copyright issues with commercial use. Google needs to define clear rules about what is allowed and what is not.
• Users risk losing their critical thinking. AI is here to optimize your thinking, not to replace it. It’s a partnership, a team.

11. The Positive Sides of NotebookLM

Despite its drawbacks NotebookLM excels in many areas:

• It feels hard at first, but it’s user-friendly and easy to use.
• It’s a time-saver and one of the best free AI tools for analyzing videos, files, websites, and text.
• It’s versatile, suitable for creators, students, researchers, or professionals.
• The fact that it’s developed by Google means that personal information uploaded won’t be linked out, because privacy and security are very important to Google.

12. 3 Ways Bloggers Can Use NotebookLM

• You can add top-ranking blog posts and ask AI to identify the common points between them, analyze their SEO tactics, what makes them successful, and analyze their backlinks. Bloggers are often advised to analyze their competitors, which can take hours manually—this is where NotebookLM is very helpful.
• You can gain ideas and deep knowledge about an article you’re writing.
• You can generate SEO-optimized content outlines. Upload at least three top blog posts targeting the same keywords, then ask NotebookLM to generate a content outline. It will be extremely accurate. However, NotebookLM can’t write blog posts for you. For creative writing with free AI tools, use Claude AI or ChatGPT. Also, never write 100% of your article with AI—you need to add your personal touch and human perspective. I explain why and how to do that in other blog posts.

13. 3 Ways Self-Growth Enthusiasts Can Use NotebookLM

• You can upload a whole book to NotebookLM or a YouTube audiobook, and NotebookLM can summarize all the main points for you.
• You can interact with this knowledge—NotebookLM’s chatbot can be your coach and answer all your questions.
• You can ask NotebookLM to generate goals, affirmations, or questions to help you implement what you are learning. While it won’t replace a real coach or mentor, you can see that it’s helpful in many ways.

14. NotebookLM vs ChatGPT

NotebookLM is a knowledge management tool that helps users store, organize, and interact with information they upload.

ChatGPT is an AI conversational assistant. It’s broader. It can help with generating text, answering questions, brainstorming ideas, providing explanations, and assisting with a variety of writing tasks.

The differences are:

• NotebookLM is passive; it just answers what you ask. ChatGPT is very reactive and makes it feel like you are talking to a friend.
• NotebookLM doesn’t make up ideas or search online; its only source is what you uploaded. ChatGPT considers what you upload but also creates things and searches online. Even if you tell it to focus only on what you uploaded, it will hardly respect that.
• For example, if NotebookLM doesn’t have access to information, it will let you know, but ChatGPT will do everything possible to find it. So, it’s no surprise that many people report that ChatGPT sometimes gives inaccurate information. Well, in the AI world, we call that a mistake.
• ChatGPT offers broader creative capabilities, while NotebookLM is focused only on uploaded knowledge management.

For a content writer or researcher, NotebookLM’s specific features make it an unbeatable choice.

FAQs About NotebookLM

1. Can NotebookLM create a podcast?
   NotebookLM helps organize your podcast script and research but does not directly produce audio files.

2. Is NotebookLM free?
   Yes, it’s in beta and completely free. There is no premium version for now, but that might change in the future.

3. Can NotebookLM read images?
   No, NotebookLM does not support image analysis yet.

4. What are NotebookLM alternatives?
   Consider tools like Evernote, Notion, and Microsoft OneNote for non-AI-driven solutions.

5. Does NotebookLM support offline usage?
   No, an internet connection is required.

6. Can NotebookLM handle multiple languages?
   Yes, NotebookLM can process notes in various languages, but the audio generation feature is only in English.

7. Is NotebookLM suitable for team collaboration?
   Currently, NotebookLM is focused on individual users, but with the share button, you can add viewers or editors via their email.

8. How many sources can NotebookLM handle?
   You can upload up to 50 items.

9. How many notebooks can you create with NotebookLM?
   Up to 100.
   

In conclusion my friend, this is a revolution.

It’s a must-have for any content creator, entrepreneur, student, researcher or anyone who really understand the problem that this AI tool solve.

It’s helpful no matter your job, business or niche.

But remember, it’s only the beginning and many changes will be made throughout the year. I’ll frequently update this blog post to keep you informed.

Before I end this article, let me just share one more piece of info with NotebookLM, as they will use it in their podcast.

I’m Irland, a young man who created AIBusinessLift Blog, where we like to share AI writing tools and tips with entrepreneurs, especially content writers, bloggers, and digital marketers.