Gemini Spark: Google launches the AI agent for $99.99/month that works 24/7 even offline

Announced at Google I/O 2026, officially deployed for US subscribers of the AI Ultra offer since late May and expanded this summer: Gemini Spark is Google's first persistent cloud AI agent for the general public. It works 24/7, even when your phone is off or your laptop is closed. Price: $99.99/month (or €99.99/month in Europe), included in the AI Ultra subscription.

What Spark really does

Unlike traditional assistants that respond on demand, Spark executes continuous workflows in the background:

• Scans your bank statements to spot forgotten subscriptions
• Monitors school emails and flags urgent ones
• Automatically summarizes meetings
• Generates Google Docs from recurring contexts
• Writes follow-up emails for ongoing projects
• Connects to third-party apps: Adobe, Spotify, calendars, dev tools

All in an autonomous and recurring manner. You set up a workflow, Spark repeats it daily, weekly, without you having to ask again.

It's the first consumer agent that truly breaks from the "I ask a question, it answers" model. It works while you sleep.

The architecture: cloud first

Unlike Apple Intelligence (which focuses on local execution + Private Cloud Compute), Spark runs entirely in the Google cloud. Three consequences:

1. It continues to work even offline: phone off, airplane, dead battery—the job continues.
2. It has native access to Google data (Gmail, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Calendar) without manual OAuth.
3. It raises a serious privacy question: everything goes through Google servers, with AI processing your most intimate content.

The Halo interface on Android—announced for late 2026

Google is preparing a specific visual layer: Halo, an Android mode that displays in real-time what Spark is doing. Home screen transformed into an agent dashboard, task history, kill switch control—this last feature has become almost mandatory for enterprise buyers post-UK AISI incidents.

The pricing strategy

At $99.99/month, Spark positions itself in the premium logic:

• ChatGPT Plus: $23/month (but Sol + Codex are paid)
• ChatGPT Pro: $200/month
• Claude Pro: $20/month—Claude Max up to $200/month
• Gemini Advanced (AI Pro): $20/month
• Google AI Ultra (with Spark included): $99.99/month

Google positions itself between classic premium offers and the top-tier ChatGPT Pro. The value proposition relies entirely on the persistent agent—without it, the subscription doesn't offer much more than Gemini Advanced.

Why it's a turning point

Three reasons:

1. It's the first AI agent billed like an employee. $100/month is the average price of a pro Notion + Zapier subscription + a cloud automation. Google is trying to make an agent a team member paid monthly.
2. The Google lock-in tightens. Once your workflows run on Spark, switching providers becomes very costly—not just technically but operationally.
3. It's the first time Google takes the lead over OpenAI on a major product category since GPT-4. Operator (OpenAI) doesn't run in persistent cloud.

The nuance

Actual adoption? The numbers aren't public. Google is notoriously bad at retaining premium subscribers (remember Stadia, multi-layered YouTube Premium, Google One struggling). At $100/month, the barrier is high for individuals. The real market is probably SMEs and freelancers, where Spark can replace half an administrative position—but B2B sales aren't Google's specialty.

To watch

Two milestones in the next 3-6 months: the full European deployment (partially blocked by the AI Act), and OpenAI's response, which is preparing a "ChatGPT Autonomous" according to several sources. A third credible competitor could force Google to quickly lower the price. This "24/7 agent" category is emerging; it's too early to say who will dominate it.