Gemini Deep Research
Ranked 2 of 6 research agents by recommenders
People recommend it for long, source-backed reports that reach beyond ordinary search. Critics most often say its reports are verbose and contain fabricated content.
People recommend it for long, source-backed reports that reach beyond ordinary search. Critics most often say its reports are verbose and contain fabricated content.
46 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 27
- criticize it
- 19
- approval share
- 59%
Recommended in 9 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 27 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 1.4 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 9 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Gathers many sources with backlinks
“Deep Research reports I think are above average internet quality, they collect hundreds of sources, synthesize and contrast them & provide backlinks.”
Comment from 1 Dec 2025 in “Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release” “especially if you use Deep Research to ground it in multiple sources”
Comment from 6 Nov 2025 in “The trust collapse: Infinite AI content is awful” Produces detailed, in-depth reports
“today I've already had Gemini Deep Research write investigative reports previously unfeasible for me”
Comment from 17 May 2026 in “Accelerando (2005)” “The results of Gemini go deep, are thoughtful and make sense.”
Comment from 13 Nov 2025 in “GPT-5.1: A smarter, more conversational ChatGPT” “I used Gemini Deep Research to build a high-fidelity reference of Kannada linguistics”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Show HN: Swalpa – Spoken Kannada learning platform built with Antigravity” Surfaces information beyond normal search
“you can consume information that's more out of distribution than what you would have consumed had you done only Google Searches”
Comment from 19 Feb 2026 in “AI makes you boring” “Deep research at least helps with dowsing for the knowledge”
Comment from 24 Mar 2026 in “Is anybody else bored of talking about AI?” Helpful for planning and research
“I love it. Most recently was reviewing PhD programs in my area then deep diving into faculty research areas.”
Comment from 3 Nov 2025 in “Tongyi DeepResearch – open-source 30B MoE Model that rivals OpenAI DeepResearch” “was able to give me a well planned 4 day trip to a major city”
Comment from 9 Jun 2026 in “Siri AI”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Fabricates or hallucinates content
“Gemini did the same thing but the report was about twenty pages. 100% hallucinated.”
Comment from 4 Jul 2026 in “Gone but Not Forgotten: Recovering the Dead Web” “If I question the AI on the report, they both admit they just made it up.”
Comment from 20 Feb 2026 in “Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview” “it just lied and fabricated the result of a theorem in its output”
Comment from 26 Jan 2026 in “Case study: Creative math – How AI fakes proofs” - Comment from 17 Sep 2026 in “I had Gemini train its own replacement for $9”
Verbose with long academic preamble
“its so overly verbose, with no easy way to tone down the wordiness.”
Comment from 4 Feb 2026 in “Microsoft's Pivotal AI Product Is Running into Big Problems” “Nothing I can do prevents it from giving me a page of background that tries to make the question sound important and interesting, even when it isn't.”
Comment from 8 Sep 2026 in “I-have-ADHD: A skill to stop coding agents from burying the answer” “It always starts with a long grandiose preamble and then sounds way too academic”
Comment from 17 Sep 2026 in “I had Gemini train its own replacement for $9”
Other research agents people recommend
The four most recommended other research agents, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Autoresearch by Karpathy | 37 | 15 | 71% | 6 | — | Approved |
| Gemini Deep ResearchThis page | 27 | 19 | 59% | 9 | — | — |
| OpenAI Deep Research | 13 | 15 | 46% | 8 | — | — |
| Kagi Research | 9 | 0 | 100% | 7 | — | — |
| LangAlpha | 8 | 2 | 80% | 1 | — | — |
What people said
40 of the 54 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“It always starts with a long grandiose preamble and then sounds way too academic”
“it basically said it was a bunch of "hallucinated bullshit"”
“Nothing I can do prevents it from giving me a page of background that tries to make the question sound important and interesting, even when it isn't.”
“Gemini's Deep Research is pretty good.”
“Deep Research gives noticeably better results.”
“holy crap I had literally just lived a SciFi scene!”
“Gemini did the same thing but the report was about twenty pages. 100% hallucinated.”
“Google has their own "Deep Research" option in this space which seems to work well.”
“was able to give me a well planned 4 day trip to a major city”
“Gemini and Gemini deep research are awesome. The export to google docs in Gemini deep research is tough to beat too.”
“today I've already had Gemini Deep Research write investigative reports previously unfeasible for me”
“This will unlock a whole new level of capability.”
“In a typical Gemini Deep Research fashion, it came back with a very obscure recommendation claiming everyone is using it.”
“I felt like OpenAI's other products, like Deep Research, agent mode, etc, were the same way.”
“Deep research at least helps with dowsing for the knowledge”
“The result is pretty good!”
“But how do I know Gemini didn't hallucinate the same things Claude did?”
“ask for 5-10 researches focused on details and the majority will be wasted on the introduction and already explored topics”
“I used Gemini Deep Research to build a high-fidelity reference of Kannada linguistics”
“asking for the why makes for a much better response”
“GDR is one of the best debugging tools for problems where you don't have full understanding.”
“OpenAI and Google's Deep Research produce a very long, 100% made up report.”
“If I question the AI on the report, they both admit they just made it up.”
“you can consume information that's more out of distribution than what you would have consumed had you done only Google Searches”
“their Deep Research usually works the hardest, as long as I run it during off-hours”
“for me the results where too technical and not structural or high level as i describe them here”
“its so overly verbose, with no easy way to tone down the wordiness.”
“I think tools like Gemini deep research and NoteBookLM are superb tools.”
“it just lied and fabricated the result of a theorem in its output”
“the most consistent at actually using the search results for this”
“Claude code and Gemini deep research is much much more better in terms of quality”
“a clear shift from simple search augmentation toward fully autonomous, research-grade intelligence”
“Try the same question in deep research mode.”
“Deep Research reports I think are above average internet quality, they collect hundreds of sources, synthesize and contrast them & provide backlinks.”
“after ten minutes of trawling through obscure forum posts it came back with a blunt "No"”
“Because the $250 per-month price for Gemini's deep-research tier is hard to justify right now”
“The results of Gemini go deep, are thoughtful and make sense.”
“especially if you use Deep Research to ground it in multiple sources”
“I like my coding assistant and deep.research”
“I love it. Most recently was reviewing PhD programs in my area then deep diving into faculty research areas.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.