One of Gemini's newest features is already ruined, and it's all Google's fault

During its I/O opening keynote yesterday, Google talked a lot about various new Gemini features. There’s Gemini Spark, Gemini Omni, Gemini 3.5 Flash, and so much more. However, out of all the Gemini things announced, the one that caught my attention the most is Gemini Daily Brief.

Daily Brief is being pitched as a “personalized morning digest that’s designed to be your first stop every day.” You can access Daily Brief right in the Gemini app, where it’ll remind you of upcoming flights, calendar appointments, recent purchases, and more.

All of this sounds great on paper, and if it works, it could be tremendously helpful. However, right from day one, Gemini Daily Brief has already lost my trust — and it’s all Google’s fault.

Google tried this already, and it was a disaster

If Daily Brief sounds familiar to you, that’s because Google released something very similar less than a year ago. When Google launched the Pixel 10 series last August, one of the big new software features on the phones was Daily Hub. The pitch behind Daily Hub was to be a central place to see reminders, calendar events, and other relevant info. In other words, it was essentially doing exactly what Google is attempting now with Gemini’s Daily Brief.

There was just one problem with Daily Hub — it was a complete disaster. What was wrong with Daily Hub? How much time do you have?

The idea behind Daily Hub was sound, but in practice, the feature proved completely worthless. Here are just a few examples of what it was like:

• Daily Hub showed the weather, but only a single temperature for that current time of day; no hourly forecast, daily forecast, or anything more in-depth.
• Podcast and YouTube recommendations were a persistent feature … and once surfaced an AI-generated video about Honey Boo Boo from TLC’s Toddlers & Tiaras.
• The Gemini-powered “topics of interest” recommendations ranged from wonderfully generic “Enhance sleep with smartwatches” to downright perplexing “Perfect belly dance finger cymbals.”
• Daily Hub repeatedly failed to surface timely emails (such as tickets) when I would have needed them.
• There was zero integration with Google Tasks, Google Keep, Fitbit, and other Google apps that would be perfect for this type of feature.

Given how much of my daily life revolves around Google apps/services, I was legitimately excited about Daily Hub when Google announced it. However, it didn’t take long to realize that the feature was completely underbaked. Google quickly came to the same conclusion: just a few days after the Pixel 10 lineup hit store shelves, Google pulled Daily Hub from the phones.

This was supposed to be a “temporary pause,” but fast-forward to May 2026, and Daily Hub still hasn’t returned to the Pixel 10 series — and likely never will. It’s one of the most embarrassing software releases I’ve seen from Google in my 13+ years in this industry, and now Google wants us to believe that this time is different with Gemini Daily Brief.

What Gemini Daily Brief needs to do differently

If that’s all true, why am I still rooting for Daily Brief to work? Because, if executed properly, features like Daily Hub and Daily Brief could be great.

Having one centralized place to see Gmail emails I need to know about, upcoming reminders in Google Tasks, my Google Health activity stats, timely Google Home alerts, and Google Maps traffic updates could legitimately change how I use my phone. But that’s all in theory. In theory, Daily Hub was supposed to be this game-changing feature, too, but we all know how that turned out.

For Gemini Daily Brief to succeed, it needs to actually execute on that vision. It needs to deliver on being a one-stop shop for my entire phone and my Google account. If it does that, great. But if it’s just a glorified bullet list for emails and calendar appointments — which early renders suggest — then we’re likely just looking at another Daily Hub situation.

Gemini Daily Brief is rolling out now to Google One AI Plus, AI Pro, and AI Ultra subscribers, so it won’t be too long before we know if it’ll follow in Daily Hub’s footsteps. I certainly hope not, but Google has a lot to prove.