Leading AI giants are rolling out a flurry of new offerings in quick succession, who is seizing the next round of growth?
AI giants are accelerating their penetration into the education sector.
Recently, OpenAI, Google and Gauth have successively upgraded their education products, with service scope expanding from knowledge Q&A to learning tutoring, course teaching and further education planning. As AI is more deeply involved in students' actual learning process, how is the competitive focus of AI education changing?
01
ChatGPT Enters the College Application Track,
1.2 Million Teenagers Learn With AI
On October 7, OpenAI released the latest progress of the youth version of ChatGPT. In addition to disclosing the actual learning status of users, OpenAI also announced a number of product updates, the most important new move of which is to extend the service scope from daily learning to college application.
According to the data disclosed by OpenAI, as the youth version of ChatGPT is opened to more users, students have shown relatively clear learning demands. Within one week, nearly 1.2 million teenagers used the learning visualization function to help understand mathematics and science concepts; more than 180,000 teenagers used the learning mode to get step-by-step learning guidance. Judging from the commonly used initial prompts for conversations, students do not only ask AI to give answers directly, but also ask ChatGPT to help improve their ideas through questions, provide feedback on drafts, and check arguments.
These usage data have become the basis for OpenAI to continue expanding its education functions. According to its disclosure, hundreds of thousands of American teenagers have been using ChatGPT every week to prepare for college applications, including learning about the admission requirements of different schools, inquiring about application deadlines, sorting out required materials, and understanding financial aid policies.
In response to these demands, OpenAI announced that it will soon launch College Planner, which integrates application information originally scattered on different websites and in different documents.
Students can add the universities they plan to apply to the list, and ChatGPT will then summarize the application requirements, deadlines, pending tasks and financial aid application steps of different schools, and generate a continuously updatable application plan. For example, when students apply to multiple universities at the same time, they can view the material requirements of each school in the same timeline, confirm which tasks have been completed and which are still pending, and continue to ask ChatGPT questions when encountering requirements they do not understand.
In addition to application material management, College Planner will also provide relevant information such as grants, scholarships and application fee waivers. According to OpenAI's plan, the first phase will mainly target high school students in grades 10 to 12 in the United States who are preparing to apply for four-year universities, and then gradually expand to more countries, as well as other types of educational institutions such as two-year colleges, technical colleges and vocational schools.
However, OpenAI does not intend to let AI directly decide which university students apply for. It positions College Planner as an auxiliary tool for application affairs, which mainly helps students sort out information, understand requirements and track progress, while decisions involving school selection, personal development direction and other issues still need to be completed by students together with parents and school counselors.
Supporting the new product, OpenAI also announced its support for the non-profit organization College Advising Corps. This organization mainly provides counseling services for American high schools with insufficient further education guidance resources to help students complete college applications. OpenAI's support will be used to promote its expansion to more states and establish AI-related training programs, so that counselors can explore how to use AI to help more students complete applications and enrollment preparations.
Apart from college applications, OpenAI is also continuing to improve the daily learning functions of ChatGPT.
In this update, one improvement is the upload of learning materials. Previously, students needed to take pictures page by page, organize and upload class notes. Now, iOS users can continuously take pictures of multiple pages of materials, and ChatGPT will automatically merge them into a PDF for subsequent learning. The Android version is still under development.
Another new function is flashcards. Students can upload class notes, or directly specify a theme that needs to be reviewed, and let ChatGPT automatically generate corresponding flashcards. For example, when preparing for a biology exam, students can convert course knowledge points into flashcards, mark the content they have mastered during the practice process, recheck the wrong parts, or shuffle the order of flashcards for review. The generated flashcard sets can also be saved in the library for easy later use.
The interactive quiz function has also been improved. Students can directly generate practice questions based on the uploaded notes, and ChatGPT can more accurately identify the user's demand for quizzes and generate interactive exercises in the conversation.
Judging from these functions, OpenAI is integrating functions such as material sorting, knowledge review and interactive practice that were originally scattered in different learning software into ChatGPT, enabling students to complete more learning tasks in the same product.
This update also involves the security issue of minors using AI. OpenAI announced that it will support the Digital Health Lab of Boston Children's Hospital and its Student Advisory Committee in the next three years, allowing teenagers to participate in the testing and design of AI tools. In the 2026-2027 academic year, the project plans to recruit about 22 students, of whom about 10 will focus on participating in projects related to AI chatbots and emerging technologies, and provide suggestions on issues such as default security settings, parental control, notification mechanisms and AI literacy.
OpenAI also disclosed that teenagers use ChatGPT for less than 15 minutes on average every day, and users who use it continuously for more than three hours account for less than 2%. For long-time use, the product also sets rest reminders. Nearly half of the teenagers who receive reminders will pause or end their use within five minutes.
This round of updates covers multiple aspects such as learning materials, knowledge review, college application and minor-oriented product design. Among them, the launch plan of College Planner is particularly prominent: ChatGPT has begun to enter the application management link that was originally undertaken by further education information platforms, school counselors and professional further education service institutions, further expanding the scope of education services.
02
Google Upgrades Gemini Notebook,
Notes Turn Into AI Tutors
While OpenAI extends its services to college applications, Google's recent updates are more focused on the learning process itself.
On September 15, Google announced the upgrade of Gemini Notebook, adding new real-time voice dialogue, class recording, interactive learning overview and multiple quiz forms. The predecessor of Gemini Notebook was NotebookLM. After being renamed in July this year, it continues to operate as an independent product, and strengthens the connection with products such as the Gemini app and Google Search. Google previously disclosed that NotebookLM has more than 30 million users and more than 600,000 using institutions.
The most significant change in this update is that students will be able to directly communicate with their own learning materials in real time through voice. After uploading class notes, courseware or other materials, students can ask AI to explain complex concepts step by step, and interrupt, ask follow-up questions or adjust the explanation method at any time during the explanation process. Different from ordinary voice chat, this function is mainly developed around the materials provided by users, and plans to support nearly 100 languages, first launched for Google AI Ultra subscribers aged 18 and above.
The processing methods of learning materials have also been expanded. Students can upload handwritten notes by taking pictures, record class lectures through mobile terminals, and convert the materials into content summaries, infographics, flashcards and interactive quizzes. The quiz function plans to add question types such as short answer, multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank, and students can also ask AI about their practice performance. The short video overview can combine animation and narration to convert the materials into a 60-second explanation video.
Apart from Gemini Notebook, Google is also continuously improving the learning functions of other products. In August this year, Google Search added interactive knowledge visualization and customized quizzes, covering multiple subjects and exams such as SAT, ACT, GRE, LSAT, and cooperated with education institutions such as The Princeton Review to introduce professional exam preparation content.
The Study Notebooks previously launched by the main Gemini app focuses more on personalized learning plans. After students upload course materials and complete diagnostic quizzes, the system can identify weak knowledge points, generate short courses and interactive exercises, and adjust learning content according to subsequent performance. This function can also be synchronized with Gemini Notebook to reduce the operation of repeated material uploads.
The school end is also an important part of Google's layout. According to previously disclosed data, more than 150 million teachers and students around the world use Google Classroom and Assignments.
In 2026, Google will continue to promote the integration of Gemini and Classroom, and plans to support teachers to create learning notebooks, assign learning tasks based on course materials, and obtain feedback on students' learning status.
In addition, Google is also expanding product coverage through free student subscriptions. In September this year, Google announced that it would provide one-year free access to Google AI Pro for eligible American college students, and one-year free access to Google AI Plus in more than 140 eligible markets outside the United States.
From Search, Gemini Notebook to Google Classroom, Google is connecting knowledge query, material sorting, learning tutoring and classroom management. Compared with OpenAI which mainly relies on ChatGPT to expand education services, Google has an existing product system covering personal learning and school teaching, which can further expand its AI education business on the basis of original users and application scenarios.
03
Gauth Launches Unlimited Canvas,
AI Tutoring Moves Towards Visualization
While OpenAI and Google continue to expand their education functions, Gauth, which focuses on learning scenarios, is also updating its own products.
On October 1, Gauth announced the launch of Unlimited Digital Canvas in Gauth AI Course, trying to change the presentation of AI courses through a continuous interactive whiteboard. This is an important adjustment in course organization and navigation since the launch of Gauth AI Course.
Different from traditional slide-based courses, the unlimited digital canvas places knowledge explanations on the same continuously extendable whiteboard. With the playback of AI narration, chapter content unfolds gradually. Students can zoom in to view a specific step, or zoom out to observe the connection between different knowledge points.
For example, when explaining the formation process of a tornado, the system can show how temperature, wind and air pressure interact through continuous 3D visualization content, instead of splitting these knowledges into several independent static charts. For subjects involving complex concepts such as mathematics, physics, biology, geography and computer science, Gauth also provides 3D simulation and dynamic demonstration in some advanced courses.
The unlimited canvas also adds an instant tutoring function. When students do not understand a certain step, they can pause at any time and ask the AI tutor questions. The system will directly write the supplementary explanation under the student's current learning position, so that the previous explanation and subsequent follow-up questions are retained in the same space.
In addition to pre-set courses, Gauth also supports users to generate interactive courses based on personal themes or uploaded documents, equipped with synchronized narration, blackboard notes and in-class tests. After the course is interrupted, the system can restore the last learning position and canvas zoom state. Students can also export the complete course as a horizontal PDF or share it via a link. At present, the unlimited digital canvas has been launched in the mathematics and history course resource library, and some advanced interaction and 3D functions for personalized courses are still planned to be launched in subsequent versions.
Compared with ChatGPT and Gemini, Gauth's this update is more focused on AI tutoring itself. It not only allows students to get answers, but also tries to organize knowledge explanations into a process closer to real tutoring through blackboard writing, animation, simulation and instant follow-up questions.
The three companies have different focuses in their education layouts. OpenAI extends to a wider range of education services with the user base of ChatGPT; Google relies on its existing search, learning and classroom products to promote AI to integrate into the daily usage scenarios of students and teachers; Gauth continues to deeply cultivate subject tutoring, seeking differentiation in course presentation and teaching interaction.
Although the paths are different, the direction is gradually clear: it is no longer just to let students use AI, but to let AI participate more deeply in the learning process and become an important part of completing learning tasks.
This article is from the WeChat official account "Duojing" (ID: DJEDUINNO), written by Si Luo, authorized for release by 36Kr.