NotebookLM Plus vs Free: what's the difference?

In more detail

The standard tier supports 100 notebooks, up to 50 sources per notebook and, since 2 September 2026, a compute-based usage quota that refreshes every 5 hours up to a weekly limit. Paid Google AI plans raise those limits: Google AI Plus allows 200 notebooks and 100 sources per notebook, Google AI Pro 500 notebooks and 300 sources, and Google AI Ultra 500 notebooks and 500 or 600 sources. Usage limits are 2× standard on Google AI Plus and 4× on Google AI Pro, and Google AI Ultra gets 5× or 20× the Google AI Pro limit depending on the subscription. Paid plans also add customization (tone, focus, and length of Audio Overviews and chat responses), premium models for tougher reasoning, and shared notebooks with role-based access (viewer/editor). Google has changed the packaging and naming of these plans more than once, and availability and pricing differ by account and region, so check Google's current Gemini Notebook help page rather than relying on a third-party summary. For casual users the standard tier is genuinely generous; for large literature reviews and shared notebooks, a paid Google plan is the upgrade path.