India tops global Google Lens usage as visual searches grow 70% in 2025
India also became one of the first markets where Google launched its most advanced AI-led Search features.
If 2024 was the year India embraced generative AI, 2025 was the year Indians changed how they searched altogether. Search moved from typing and tapping to pointing, circling, showing, speaking, and eventually, thinking with AI.
Globally, visual searches grew 70% annually, but India stood in a league of its own. More people used Google Lens in India than in any other country. Google Lens evolved from identifying objects to interpreting scenes. Users can upload an image of a shelf, a device, or a street, and AI Mode understands object relationships, relevance, and what to focus on next.
India also became one of the first markets where Google launched its most advanced AI-led Search features.
2025 saw search expanding beyond information retrieval into a personal intelligence layer that helps users interpret the world, solve problems, and take action in real time.
AI mode arrives, and India gets it first
Google launched its AI Search experience, AI Mode, in India ahead of most global markets. Available in eight Indian languages, it reshaped how users handled complex queries.
Last month, AI Mode received its biggest upgrade yet with Gemini 3. With stronger reasoning, deeper multimodal understanding, and more agentic capabilities, Gemini 3 allows users to ask layered questions that once required multiple tabs, long-form research, and domain knowledge.
Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers can now access these capabilities through the “Thinking with 3 Pro” option inside AI Mode.
Nano Banana Pro: When Search helps you see ideas
Nano Banana Pro, a new image generation and editing model built on Gemini 3 Pro, is more than an art tool; it is tied directly into Search’s knowledge graph.
Designers can turn abstract ideas into prototypes, analysts can convert data into visual formats, and creators can generate storyboards grounded in real-world context. The model expands Search from answering questions to visualising ideas.
In fact, in AI Mode, subscribers can use Nano Banana Pro through the “Create Images Pro” tool.
A personal fitting room for a nation that shops online
This year, Google rolled out a Virtual Apparel Try-On feature, allowing shoppers to try on billions of clothing items—from tops and dresses to jackets and shoes—across Search, Google Shopping, and Google Images.
Users can upload their photo and see how the fabric drapes, folds, and stretches on their body. Powered by a custom AI model capable of understanding diverse body types and fabric physics, the feature aims to reduce friction in online shopping, especially in a market where return rates have historically been high.
The breakthroughs that re-shaped search in 2025
Already popular with Android users, Circle to Search became smarter when paired with AI Mode. Users can circle anything on their screen—formulas, diagrams, or text—and get instant, complex explanations within the overlay, without switching apps.
Among Google’s most futuristic releases was Search Live, where users can point their camera at a broken appliance, a math equation, a form, a bike chain, or even a skin rash, and talk to Search as if video-calling an expert. Search Live analyses the scene and responds in real time. It launched in English and Hindi, with a mobile-first design.
Meanwhile, with Google Flights, users can now plan trips conversationally. Asking, “A week-long winter trip to a place with great food, nonstop only,” prompts Flight Deals to interpret intent, match destinations, and surface real-time prices from its flight feature.