How to Disable Google Gemini in Chrome

If you use it Google Chrome browser for desktop, maybe there is a Gemini Nano AI example it is running on your computer right now and takes up about 4 GB of space. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but if you didn’t know about it and don’t want it, there is a way to turn it off.

This file started downloading automatically for Chrome users in 2024 after Google built Gemini Nano into the browser. But report by Private Guy this week and the reception it received showed that many users were unaware—perhaps due to the flood of AI services and technology tools that have become difficult for users to keep up with.

To remove the Gemini Nano file, open Chrome on your computer, in the upper right corner click on the button “more” menu represented by three vertical dotsthen go to Favorites, Orderand then change it “AI on the device” to be off. The Privacy Guy article also mentioned that if you directly remove the Gemini Nano file from the directory, Chrome will download it silently, and download it again the next time it restarts.

A Google spokesperson tells WIRED that the company began rolling out an on-device AI system in February to allow users to turn off the feature if they choose to remove it. “Once suspended, the version will not download or update,” the spokesperson said. The company added that the system was designed so that the Gemini Nano “will only remove if the device has limited resources.”

Google built the feature into Chrome to help detect AI fraud on devices. It also aimed to provide a way for developers to integrate AI-enabled solutions by storing data on users’ devices where possible and outside of the cloud. These things are different Chrome’s AI Modewho do not use the nearby Gemini Nano model.

Parisa Tabriz, Chrome’s general manager, emphasized in a post on X Wednesday that the Gemini Nano integration “provides important security capabilities such as device fraud detection and developer APIs without sending your data to the cloud.”

Google certainly did announce it The integration of Gemini Nano in Chrome is they discussed that publicly, but for users who only use Chrome because it is the largest browser in the world, the most popular and does not follow any changes, the lack of information on your face about the large AI file with the navigation on your computer can be frustrating.

Davi Ottenheimer, a longtime security and compliance developer, says he follows Chrome updates closely but could have easily missed the Gemini Nano integration. “The device model can be a hidden space,” he says. And the fact that Google launched the integration in 2024 but didn’t start putting controls in place for users to turn it off until February shows that, at first, the feature wasn’t thought of as something that users would agree with.

Because you he can Removing Gemini Nano from Chrome doesn’t mean you should—or that doing so is good for your privacy.

Localization is a secret way of using AI technology. If you remove the brand, Google’s analytics, including AI-powered fraud detection, will stop working. But since Gemini Nano is also used by Chrome to enable local AI development for third-party developers, blocking this option could have several consequences for connecting to non-Google websites in the browser. A Google spokesperson tells WIRED that when you turn off Device AI, “some security tools will not be available, and websites that use device APIs will behave differently.”

Of course, if neither method seems right, there’s always an alternative: Use a different browser.