How To Create an AI Podcast with Google’s NotebookLM

At this year's Google I/O, one of the standout innovations was Project Tailwind, a new kind of AI-powered notebook designed to help people learn and organize information more efficiently. Now, this exciting project has been renamed and officially introduced as NotebookLM, an experimental tool from Google Labs. Built with the powerful capabilities of a language model (hence the "LM"), NotebookLM aims to redefine notetaking, making it smarter and more intuitive. It even has the capability to generate podcasts, a feature we'll be diving into in today’s article.

Your podcast will sound similar to the following. This podcast was generated with NotebookLM and a link to our documentation!

Let's now look at how you can create your own podcast!

1. Go to NotebookLM

First, navigate to https://notebooklm.google.com/ and use your Google account to sign in.

2. Click New Notebook

If you are new to NotebookLM then you will be prompted to create a new notebook, like below. Click ‘Create’.

If you have used NotebookLM before, then click ‘New Notebook’:

3. Add Sources

When creating a notebook, you will be prompted to add sources. Sources let NotebookLM base its responses on the information that matters most to you. These can include links, YouTube videos, marketing plans, course reading, research notes, meeting transcripts, sales documents, etc.

In this article, we will use our GitHub repository at https://github.com/marqo-ai/marqo. To upload this link, we click on the ‘Website’ icon highlighted in the image below. Note, you can also add Google Docs, Google Slides, YouTube links and copied text as sources.

Now paste the link to your website into the 'Paste URL' box. Then click ‘Insert’.

4. Click ‘Notebook Guide’

When submitting your sources, the ‘Notebook Guide’ should automatically pop up. If it doesn’t, you can find it in the bottom right-hand corner of your notebook:

Once the notebook guide pops up, you will see the option to generate an audio overview.

4. Generate Audio Overview

In order to create your podcast, you need to generate an audio overview. To do so, click 'Generate' under 'Audio overview' as outlined in the image below:

After you click ‘Generate’, it will take a couple of minutes for your podcast to be generated. Once it has done so, you can download it as an audio file:

It really is as easy as that!

5. Example

Here's the podcast generated from pasting our documentation website into NotebookLM.

Conclusion

In this article, we’ve explored how to leverage Google's innovative NotebookLM to create your own podcasts effortlessly. With its ability to process and synthesize your chosen sources, NotebookLM transforms traditional notetaking into a dynamic tool that not only helps organize information but also generates valuable insights and audio content.

Whether you're summarizing complex ideas or creating engaging podcasts, NotebookLM is a powerful companion for anyone looking to streamline their workflow and turn information into accessible content. Give it a try and experience how AI can enhance your productivity and creativity!