Why start with what you have
This course teaches Google Slides, Google Vids and Gemini, the AI assistant built into them. What you can actually do depends on two things:
- Your plan. This is the account type and subscription you are on.
- Your admin's settings. These apply only if your account is managed by an organisation.
Think of it like a hire car. The model you booked decides which features the car has. The rental company can still switch some of them off. Before you learn to drive the car, check what is in it.
About this course: LevelUpWith is independent of Google. Google does not endorse, sponsor or review this course, and the course does not copy Google's documentation. When a lesson says "check Google's page", go to that page and read the current version yourself.
Step 1: Identify your account type
DO: Open Slides at slides.google.com and click your profile picture in the top-right corner. Then sort yourself into one of these groups:
- Personal (consumer), free: a standard Google account, usually ending in @gmail.com.
- Personal, with a Google AI subscription: a personal account with a paid plan such as Google AI Pro or Ultra. To confirm it, open myaccount.google.com and go to Payments & subscriptions.
- Work or school (Google Workspace): an address on your organisation's domain, for example name@company.com. The Workspace edition might be Business Starter, Standard or Plus, Enterprise, Education, Nonprofits or Frontline. Users often cannot see the edition themselves. If you cannot, ask IT.
Mobile note: the Slides app on Android and iPhone/iPad shows your account when you tap your profile picture. It does not show the plan, so check that on the web.
Step 2: Check Google's current availability pages
Plans, prices and AI features change often, sometimes every month. Treat Google's own availability pages as the source of truth. Your memory, a colleague's word and blog posts (including older ones) are not. As of 1 November 2026, these Google Help pages are the ones to use:
- Gemini in Google Slides: search Google Docs Editors Help for "Collaborate with Gemini in Google Slides".
- Google Vids: search for "Learn about availability of Gemini features in Google Vids".
This is what those pages showed on 1 November 2026. Plans change, so confirm it yourself:
- Gemini in Slides is listed for Workspace Business Standard and Plus, Enterprise Standard and Plus, and personal Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers, along with some education and add-on plans. A newer feature that generates and edits whole slides from a prompt was labelled Beta.
- Google Vids is listed for most Business and Enterprise editions, Nonprofits, Education Plus, and the Google AI Plus, Pro and Ultra plans. Personal accounts on the free plan can use the basic Vids editor at no cost, with only a few AI features and low monthly limits.
- Frontline Workspace plans are listed as having no access to Gemini features.
- Usage limits apply to some AI features, such as image generation, AI avatars and AI video clips. The image-generation limits are shared across Workspace apps, including Slides and Docs.
DO: Open both pages, find the row or section for your plan, and go to Step 3.
Step 3: Record your feature audit
DO: Create a short Google Doc called "My Slides, Vids & Gemini audit" with these columns:
| Feature | Listed for my plan? | Works for me? | Preview / Beta / unconfirmed? | Source URL | Date checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gemini side panel in Slides | |||||
| Generate slides with Gemini | |||||
| Google Vids (open and edit) | |||||
| Gemini in Vids (draft, voiceover) |
Fill it in as follows:
- Mark Listed from Google's page.
- Mark Works by testing. In Slides on the web, look for the Gemini icon at the top right. For Vids, go to vids.google.com and see whether it opens.
- Mark anything labelled Beta, preview or "limited time" as preview. If you could not confirm something, write unconfirmed rather than guessing.
- Write today's date in the Date checked column. When a later lesson relies on a feature, check this audit again before you trust it.
Step 4: Decide whether a missing feature comes from the plan or from an admin
The audit will sometimes show a feature that is listed for your plan but does not work for you. Workspace admins can turn Gemini on or off for each app, including Slides and Vids. They can also switch Vids itself off, and they can apply any of these settings to just one department (an "organisational unit").
Use this checklist:
- Not listed for your plan: the plan is the limit. Only an upgrade or add-on changes it.
- Listed, works for colleagues on the same plan, but not for you: this is most likely an admin setting for your group.
- Listed, nobody in your organisation has it: this is most likely an organisation-wide admin setting, or a rollout that has not reached you yet.
- Personal account: no admin is involved, so the plan, your region or a staged rollout is the cause.
Step 5: Write a short request to IT
DO: If an admin setting is the likely cause, send a short, specific request like this one:
Subject: Request: Gemini in Google Slides for Marketing
Hi IT team, our Workspace edition (Business Standard) lists Gemini in Google Slides on Google's availability page (checked 1 Nov 2026). It isn't available on my account (name@company.com). Could you confirm whether it is turned off for my group and, if policy allows, enable it? I'd use it to draft first-pass decks, which I review before sharing. If it's off for policy reasons, could you let me know the approved alternative? Thanks.
The request works because it does four things:
- Names the exact feature and your account.
- Cites Google's page and the date you checked it.
- States a business purpose and that you review the output.
- Respects that IT may have reasons, such as data or compliance policy, to keep the feature off.
Your task
Complete your audit document for your own account today. Fill in every row, add a date to every entry and mark anything that is preview. If a listed feature is missing, draft (or send) the IT request. Keep the audit, because later lessons will ask you to check it before using a feature.
Key takeaways
- What you can do depends on your plan and, for work accounts, your admin's settings.
- Google's current availability pages are the source of truth. Date every check.
- Mark Beta, preview and limited-time features clearly, and never assume they will stay.
- If a feature is listed for your plan but missing for you, suspect an admin setting and make a specific, polite request to IT.
- This course is independent of Google and does not reproduce its documentation.