You can now search with Google Lens in the Chromebook Gallery app

Quite some time ago, we covered a new ability that looked to be on the way for Chromebooks across the board: Google Lens in the Gallery app. Since May, we at least knew this tool would be on the way, but we didn’t really know exactly how it would play out.

Then, last month, across the board the Chrome browser gained access to the new, built-in Google Lens feature that users can leverage on just about anything they find in an open Chrome tab. You can click into the URL bar or into the 3-dot overflow menu to access that feature if you’ve not tried it; it’s pretty sweet.

A new way to Google Lens on Chromebook

This new ability, however, is one that will be exclusive to Chromebooks and works right in the Gallery app. And now that Google has it up and running, it makes sense why the other integration of Google Lens needed to be put into place first.

To try it out on ChromeOS 129 (the current, Stable build), simply open a file in the Gallery app by double-clicking it in your Files app. Once it opens up, you’ll be in your Gallery (you can also just launch your Gallery straight from the Launcher as well). Regardless of what the file type is, as long as you can view it in the Gallery app, you’re good to go. For reference, the image of this in action below is using a PDF.

Now, just hit the new Google Lens button up top and drag the cursor to ensnare whatever it is on the page you’d like to search with Google Lens. It behaves much like the Chrome-based tool I spoke of earlier in this post.

Here’s the thing: once you select it and hit that Search with Google Lens button, a new Chrome tab will immediately open with your cropped image in it, opened up to the new Chrome Google Lens feature. So what’s happening here isn’t so much a new feature built in from the ground up as much as it is simply a shortcut to search a screenshot in Chrome’s Google Lens implementation.

Technically speaking, you could use the Screen Capture tool to grab the same image, drag it into a new Chrome tab, call up Google Lens and get the same result. This new Lens implementation in the Gallery app saves you steps, obviously, but it’s not some additional version of Google Lens on your Chromebook.

And honestly, it’s a bit of simplistic genius. Why rebuild the tool when you can just make a shortcut to use it in a different location. It all just makes me feel like Chromebooks should get this same Lens integration right in the Screen Capture tool, too. It could open the Chrome-based feature just like the Gallery implementation is doing, but would simply be accessible from the Screen Capture menu.

The more places Google can surface Lens, the better. It’s a very impressive and capable way to search for just about anything you can think of. The easier it is for users to get to it, the more often they’ll remember that they have this powerful tool present throughout the operating system. And that’s a win all around.