Google is shutting down Gems. The feature that let people build their own task-specific versions of Gemini since 2024 becomes “skills” on November 17, 2026. A notice is already in the Gemini app; the migration is automatic, existing Gems keep working until then, and nobody has to do anything. 9to5Google reported it first, over the weekend.
Gems were Google’s answer to the question of how you teach an AI a role without retyping the instructions every time. The bundled ones included a learning coach, a brainstorming assistant, a career guide, a coding partner and an editor. Custom Gems could be shared, which Google hoped would make Gemini stickier.
What actually changes
The difference isn’t only the name. A Gem was its own entry point that you picked before you started. A skill is something you pull in mid-task, by typing a forward slash in the thread. TechCrunch reckons that’s an interface engineers prefer and regular people don’t, and it’s probably right.
It’s also another round of Google burning a brand name. Gems got their own icon and a fixed slot in the navigation. Two years later they’re a sub-feature with a different label.
The name comes from somewhere else
Skills as a term will be familiar from Claude, where since 2025 they are exactly this: a folder of instructions the model pulls in when the moment fits. The slash invocation comes from the same neighbourhood.
Google adopting the word is more than imitation. It’s an admission about which unit won. A custom chatbot persona belongs to a product and dies with it. A skill belongs to a task and can move between tools. Anyone building something today that models are meant to reuse tends to build it in this shape — and Google is now rebuilding to match.