AI Quick Tips 251: NotebookLM Just Got a Big Upgrade — Here’s What’s New

1. You Can Now Add PDFs and Google Sheets Directly From Drive

This is bigger than it sounds.

Previously, NotebookLM let you upload PDFs, but not PDFs stored inside Google Drive, which made no real sense to anyone using Drive as their actual document hub.

Now you can:

• Add PDFs from Drive
• Add Google Sheets from Drive
• Add Docs and Docx from Drive (still supported)

There’s a tiny UI glitch where the Drive picker hides behind the sources window, but clicking it brings it forward. Just pretend it’s 1997 and windows overlap.

Once imported, PDFs open inside NotebookLM with an option to pop them out into a full tab. Sheets work the same (and yes, you can open them fully and interact with them).

2. New “Discover from Drive” View

Under Discover, there’s now a full Google Drive option, meaning NotebookLM can find Docs, Sheets, PDFs, and Docx files without you manually navigating to them.

A small quality-of-life improvement, but a nice one.

3. Fast Research: Quick Web-Based Source Gathering

This feature shows up in the free version first, but for me, not in my paid version….yet.

Fast Research does:

• A short web scan
• Pulls together roughly 8–12 sources
• Lets you preview them
• Lets you import whichever you want into your notebook

It behaves almost exactly like the old Web Search, except nicer, faster, and with clearer source previews (including PDFs).

Good for quick “get me some resources on this” tasks.

4. Deep Research: The Headline Feature

This is the big one, and again, it’s oddly only showing in the free version at the moment (for me at least).

Deep Research:

• Runs a multi-step structured search
• Discovers far more sources (in the video demo: 38 cited + 20 uncited)
• Generates a full research report
• Lets you select sources to import into your notebook
• Works fully in the background while you work on other pages

This is NotebookLM’s answer to Deep Research tools in ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, etc.

Except this version:

• Gives you a full structured report
• Lets you keep the sources
• Lets you immediately generate mind maps, audio summaries, and documents from those sources

And most importantly: You can leave the page while it works. NotebookLM keeps processing in the background.

This makes NotebookLM feel less like a passive note-taker and more like a proper research assistant.

5. Source Management Is Now Central to Workflow

After importing sources (Drive, Fast Research, or Deep Research), you can:

• Read them
• Chat with them
• Generate mind maps
• Create audio/video overviews
• Build study guides
• Produce timelines
• Use any NotebookLM document type you normally would

This makes the new research tools feel integrated.

6. The Odd Part: Deep Research Is Free-Only (for Now)

In the demo:

• Free account: Has Fast Research + Deep Research
• Paid Pro account: Does not show Deep Research yet

This is obviously temporary, because it would make no sense for a signature feature to be stuck behind the free tier, but it’s worth noting if you don’t see it yet.

NotebookLM’s rollout logic is… an adventure sometimes.

TL;DR takeaways

You can now:

• Pull in PDFs from Drive
• Pull in Sheets from Drive
• Run quick Fast Research
• Run full Deep Research
• Generate a research report with citations
• Add discovered sources directly into your workspace

These upgrades make NotebookLM even more attractive as a research and knowledge tool, especially for students, researchers, nonprofit teams, and small businesses who want an organized “AI brain” that works from their own documents.

If you use NotebookLM, try these new features out and see what you think. If anything else launches (or moves to a different menu for no reason), I’ll create a new video and article.