How to Generate AI Images in Google Search

Forget sifting through Google Images—Google is testing out a feature that generates AI images directly within search results. 

Eligible users who have opted in to the test can ask Google’s AI to create an image directly from the regular Google search bar. For example, “draw an image of an elephant on a lake” yields four unique images generated by AI within about 6 seconds. Scrolling down from the images brings users to their standard search results.

Clicking on any of the generated images reveals the specific prompt that the generator used to make it, so users can edit it and generate as many new images as they’d like. Users can also export images as a download or to Google Drive.

To opt in to the test, enable SGE (search generative experience) by navigating to labs.google/sge/ and clicking the "Get Started" button. Alternately, toggle the feature on in your account settings following Google's instructions. Some accounts might also be prompted within search to turn the feature on, although Google hasn't yet made SGE available for all users.

This reporter didn’t hit a cap on how many images she could generate with the feature, but there were limits. Bolder prompts, like “Super Mario rigging elections,” “a flower in a burning building” and even “two people on a date,” bumped up against Google’s safeguards and couldn’t be displayed. The names of landmarks and celebrities also yielded error pages.

This is likely to avoid controversy recently faced by Microsoft and Meta after their own AI image generators displayed sensitive imagery.

Vague directions like “profound,” forgiveness” and “inspirational” also seem to confuse the image generator. This reporter was only able to get two images in response to the prompt “an illustration of a rising sun with a profound good morning quote.” Both images are fairly unintelligible, and the feature typically returns a wider selection of results.

Google announced the SGE image generator feature earlier in October, although test audiences are still limited.