Gemma, the “open” AI model Google’s family, is growing up.
During Google I/O 2025 on Tuesday, Google took wraps from the Gemma 3N, a model designed to run “smoothly” on mobile phones, laptops and tablets. According to Google, the Gemma 3N will be available in preview starting Tuesday and can process audio, text, images and videos.
The model has recently gained steam in the AI community, efficient enough to run offline and without the need for computing in the cloud. Not only is it cheaper to use than larger models, it also maintains privacy by eliminating the need to transfer data to a remote data center.
In a keynote address at I/O, Gemma Product Manager Gus Martins said that Gemma 3N can run on devices with less than 2GB of RAM. “The Gemma 3N shares the same architecture as the Gemini Nano and is designed for incredible performance,” he added.
In addition to Gemma 3N, Google is releasing Medgemma through its Health AI Developer Foundations program. According to the company, Medgemma is the most capable open model for analyzing health-related text and images.
“Medgemma (IS) Open Model Collection for Understanding Multimodal (Health) Text and Images,” Martins said. “Medgemma is excellent across a variety of image and text applications, allowing developers (…) to adapt their models to their own health apps.”
Also on the horizon is Signgemma, an open model for converting sign language into spoken text. Google says Signgemma will allow developers to create new apps and integrations for hearing impaired and hard users.
“Signgemma is a new family of models trained to translate sign language into spoken texts, but it’s perfect for American sign language and English,” Martins said. “This is the most capable model of understanding sign language to date, and we can’t wait for developers, deaf and stubborn communities to build this foundation and build it.”
What’s noteworthy is that Gemma has been criticized for its habitual, non-standard licensing conditions, with some developers saying the model is a commercially risky proposal. However, it does not reveal that developers will collectively download Gemma models thousands of times more.
Updated 2:40pm Pacific: Added some quotes from Gus Martins in Gemma Product Manager.