What is NotebookLM
NotebookLM is an AI-driven note-taking and research assistant developed by Google. Its core function is to analyze and generate content based on the documents you upload. Its main goal is to overcome two major limitations of traditional AI tools: accuracy and user-friendliness.
The table below shows how it compares with traditional tools.
Unlike general-purpose AI tools such as ChatGPT or Gemini, NotebookLM is not meant to replace conversational AI. Instead, it is positioned as a deep analysis tool that focuses on processing, understanding, and innovatively integrating your own documents.
NotebookLM is best for researchers, students, and creators who need to extract insights and spark ideas from large collections of private documents.
NotebookLM Features: What the AI Research Tool Can Do
Auto-Generated FAQ
Automatically extract key questions and answers from materials to quickly grasp the essentials.
Timeline
If the materials contain time information (such as history, biographies, project reports), it automatically organizes them into a clear timeline.
Briefing Document
Generate a concise summary of the materials to help quickly understand the content.
Mind Map
It visualizes key concepts and shows their relationships, making complex topics easier to understand.
Video Overviews
It converts notes into dynamic slide videos with AI narration and supports multiple visual styles, making it great for quick reviews and presentations.
Audio Overview
Turn text into podcast-style audio conversations, supporting Chinese. Ideal for absorbing knowledge during commutes or exercise.
Infographic
Transform data and key points in the materials into infographics for data visualization.
Slide Decks
Generate slides with images and layout based on uploaded materials with one click (currently in Beta version).
More NotebookLM Features Worth Noting
Discover Sources: You can describe a topic of interest, and the AI will search the internet and recommend relevant materials, which can be imported into your notebook with just one click, significantly expanding your research reach.
Study Guide/Flashcards: It can generate structured review materials or test cards based on your study materials, making it a great helper for exam preparation and knowledge consolidation.
NotebookLM Alternatives: When Smallppt Is the Better Choice
Slide Decks of NotebookLM are located in the “Studio” panel. Upload PDFs, web pages, or videos, and NotebookLM generates your output with one click. Exported PDFs currently include a watermark in the lower-right corner.
If you're not satisfied with the output, you'll usually need to regenerate the entire file because individual pages cannot be edited.
Compared to NotebookLM's Slide Decks, Smallppt, an AI slide deck generator, has its advantages in its more flexible, general-purpose creation workflow and the practicality of its output formats.
If your work primarily involves research and reading, and you need to quickly and accurately convert existing complex materials (such as papers, reports, videos) into presentation slides, then NotebookLM's Slide Decks is your best choice.
If you need to start from an idea or theme and create a brand new slide from scratch that requires fine-tuning and layout, or if you must obtain a directly editable slide. A PPTX file, then a universal tool like Smallppt, may be more suitable.
Comprehensive Evaluation of NotebookLM: Strengths, Weaknesses, and Pricing
Core Advantages and Highlights
- Based on Documents, Reducing "Hallucinations"
Most reviews agree that its responses are strictly based on the user-uploaded materials and accompanied by references, ensuring high reliability.
- Diverse Content Generation Forms
The audio podcast is the biggest highlight, featuring a conversation between two AI hosts, which is vivid and easy to understand. The mind map is praised for its smooth interaction and in-depth analysis. It can also generate study guides, timelines, video summaries, briefings, etc.
- Interaction and Collaboration Features
The latest "interactive mode" allows users to interrupt the audio to ask questions at any time, just like joining a discussion. It supports generating public links to share notebooks, facilitating collaboration.
- Strong Support for Multiple File Formats
It supports PDFs, web pages, video links, and audio files. The function of automatically generating verbatim transcripts when processing English videos from YouTube is widely praised.
Main Disadvantages and Limitations
- Highly Dependent on Input Quality
This is its biggest drawback. If the input is insufficient, of poor quality, or too brief, the AI will respond with "I don't know" or provide a superficial summary.
- Unstable Processing Results
It performs poorly with Chinese videos from platforms other than YouTube. Users report that it struggles with complex charts or non-textual content.
- Usability Issues
The interactive mode does not allow dragging the audio progress bar and only supports English interaction. New features like video summaries are being rolled out gradually.
- Inability to Access Real-Time Information
As a closed knowledge base, it cannot search for the latest information online (unless the "Explore Sources" feature is used to manually add it).
NotebookLM Pricing
It offers excellent value for money. The free version is already quite powerful and can meet the in-depth research needs of individuals. The paid version (NotebookLM Plus) mainly increases usage limits and offers advanced sharing and customization options.
Several Aspects to Note and Suggestions
Important Notes About Using NotebookLM
- Limited knowledge sources: Its responses are based solely on the information you provide. If the information is incomplete, it may not be able to answer or state "no answer found".
- Potential understanding deviations: Although based on the document, AI may still occasionally misunderstand the context. You should get into the habit of checking the citations NotebookLM provides.
- File format limitations: It works best with text-based files. For images, unclear scanned PDFs, or complex tables, its understanding ability may be limited.
- Data privacy: Google states that it does not use your data to train models. However, for highly sensitive business secrets or personal documents, it is still necessary to carefully assess the inherent risks of cloud services.
Practical Suggestions
- Provide high-quality materials: Upload complete, high-quality, and strongly relevant documents to the topic as a prerequisite for obtaining good results.
- Start with longer documents: Its analysis advantages are more obvious when dealing with long reports, academic papers, or long videos.
- Ask targeted follow-up questions: Conduct multiple rounds of specific questions to guide AI to deeply explore the connections between materials.
FAQs About NotebookLM
Q1: What are the fundamental differences in reliability and workflow between NotebookLM's "source-based" core principle and general-purpose AI?
NotebookLM's Q&A and outputs are strictly based on the materials you upload, accompanied by citations, ensuring high reliability and fewer hallucinations; general-purpose AI relies on its own training data and cannot precisely relate to your personal materials.
Q2: What key techniques can improve the output quality when using NotebookLM to generate slides?
Ensure the uploaded materials are of high quality and well-structured; specify the audience, key points, and visual style in the prompt before generation.
Q3: What are the differences in performance when NotebookLM processes different file formats (PDF, video, etc.)?
It performs best on text-based PDFs and web pages. It can also generate verbatim transcripts for YouTube videos for analysis; its understanding of images, scanned PDFs, or complex tables is limited.
Q4: In what scenarios are the "infographic" and "mind map" functions of NotebookLM most suitable?
Infographics are best for presenting data, processes, or statistical summaries. Mind maps are ideal for organizing concepts and the logical relationships between arguments.
Q5: Under what specific circumstances should Smallppt be chosen over NotebookLM for creating slides?
When you need to start from scratch to create a slide on a completely new topic or must obtain a directly editable .pptx file for detailed layout, Smallppt and similar general-purpose tools should be selected.
