Gemini Spark is almost a dream AI assistant — except for 1 thing Perplexity does better

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I seriously thought this day would be far out in the future, but here we are. We already have AI assistants that can take instructions and execute a series of tasks (not just one at a time) without your supervision — it’s almost like having a human assistant.

Google’s Gemini Spark is one such product. In fact, it’s one of the first of its kind to be so easily and widely accessible to end users rather than enterprises. It’s so intuitive that I instinctively gravitate towards Spark whenever I need something done within the Google ecosystem. It’s supposed to work in the background, but I just can’t help marveling at an AI assistant pulling context and information from various sources, verifying it, and executing any given task as if it were a meticulous researcher. The novelty factor alone makes it so fun to use.

Besides Gemini Spark, I’ve also extensively used its direct rival, Perplexity Computer , which has been around for much longer. My experience with both tools has helped me understand how different their approaches are, and there are some meaningful ways Gemini can improve by taking a page out of Perplexity’s book.

Once you start looking past the flashy, automated functions of Spark, you’ll notice that its biggest strength is actually the ecosystem it lives inside. Other AI tools connect to Google Workspace apps, such as Gmail and Drive, via APIs and MCP connectors, often requiring complex setup. Gemini Spark, on the other hand, has it easy as part of that family. That means it doesn’t need any external connections to work within your Docs or to pull up any old context, and it works across supported Google services.

For instance, I recently had to file a complaint with Amazon about a defective mattress they delivered. I could either do all the digging manually, spending at least 15 minutes on a needless task and breaking my workflow on a productive Monday morning — or ask Spark to do it. And you know what I chose!

Gemini Spark pulled out my order details from Gmail with just the product name, dug out Amazon’s customer support email (it’s an incredibly taxing task, as brands are increasingly burying direct contact methods under infinite submenus in a bid to push you towards their AI chatbots rather than humans), and drafted a collated email with everything clearly stated. I just needed to give it a once-over and hit send.

This is, of course, just a single example, but you can do a lot more complex stuff across Google services to weed out a lot of everyday digital friction. But once you step outside Google’s app ecosystem, you start seeing merit in how Perplexity Computer handles any given task.