We may earn an affiliate commission when you visit our partners.
Course image
Alan Slater

2025 Edition. This course covers all the 2025 Updates to the tool.

UPDATE January 2025 - added quizzes across 4 sections to help embed your learning

Overcoming source limits, analysing ebooks and how to create transcripts from your audio overviews

Covering language translation, changing the default NotebookLM language, improving your CV and analysing CVs when recruiting

Read more

2025 Edition. This course covers all the 2025 Updates to the tool.

UPDATE January 2025 - added quizzes across 4 sections to help embed your learning

Overcoming source limits, analysing ebooks and how to create transcripts from your audio overviews

Covering language translation, changing the default NotebookLM language, improving your CV and analysing CVs when recruiting

This course has been created to help you become a Pro using Google NotebookLM, this AI driven note taking tool will accelerate your learning of any topic and do the work for you as it creates study guides, briefing documents and even conversational podcasts that help you learn.

Regardless of your industry this tool can help you in a profession and personal capacity. Helping you research any topic quickly and effectively, ensuring only the bits you really need to know are presented to you and allowing you to have a conversation with it your own personal AI.

Google NotebookLM is free to use, meaning it's the ultimate tool for anyone looking to learn almost anything, The use cases are endless.

- Researching for a job interview

- Studying for an exam

- Planning a backpacking holiday

- Brainstorming a new business idea

- Developing your career

- And much much more

This tool looks to solve the problem of too much data. There is data and information everywhere and it can be hard to find what you need in the time you have available. Google NotebookLM solves this problem in the easiest most user friendly way imaginable by giving you a simple interface to plug in all the content you don't have the time to analyse and then have a conversation with that content to get from it exactly what you need.

The course is structured around not only teaching you every element of the tool, but showing you what is possible through the various use cases we have prepared.

And what's more, we provide Quizzes and challenges to help encourage you to get using the tool directly yourself.

- Frequently Asked Questions

What is Google NotebookLM?

Google NotebookLM is a AI driven research and note taking tool, allowing you to link almost any web source to give you your own AI companion that you can ask questions to learn precisely what you need to know

How can the tool benefit me?

This is the big question, almost anyone could benefit form this tool, it just depends on what you want to learn about

Does this course contain everything I need to learn Google NotebookLM?

Yes, this course contains detailed steps to take you from being an absolute beginner in Notebook to an Expert. Including:

  • Finding the right sources

  • Linking sources

  • Creating study guides, timelines, briefing documents and more

  • Creating an audio podcast summarising and teaching you about your topic

  • Questioning your teacher live

  • Sharing your notebooks

  • Capturing valuable notes with AI

  • Advanced Google NotebookLM features

Ok, so there's a lot there, do I need to do everything in the course to be able to use Google NotebookLM?

No not at all, each lecture is bitesized only being a few minutes long each, allowing you to dip in and out and test what you have learned as you go along. With your lifetime access you can come back any time to pick up where you have left off, enjoy free new lectures or revisit old lectures to refresh your memory.

I'm stuck or have additional questions, can I ask a few things?

Of course, I created this course help anyone learn from this great tool. Please feel free to use the Q&A feature to reach out and I’ll answer any questions you may have.

What you can expect

  • Ongoing support with any questions and queries you may have

  • High quality lectures that you can take in or out of order to support your style of learning

  • Updates based on feedback and new developments within Google NotebookLM

Enroll now

What's inside

Learning objectives

  • Understand how to curate ideal sources to get the output you need
  • Understand the different sources you can use and how to link them
  • Understand how to create a ai driven and conversational audio overview of your content
  • Understand how to customise your ai overview to get to the answers you need
  • Understand how to customise and share your audio overviews
  • Understand how to query your audio content
  • Understand how to chat with your own personal ai for your linked content
  • Understand how to automatically create briefing documents, timelines, study guides and more

Syllabus

Introduction
What is Google NotebookLM - Demo

A quick overview of how setting top your own google account, which is required to use Google NotebookLM

Read more

A whistle stop tour of the homepage including how to create, sort and edit the titles of notebooks

In this lecture we cover Notebook LM plus, its benefits and who it may be applicable to

In this lecture we cover what a source is and why its fundamental to the use of the tool

Your aren't getting far with Google NotebookLM without selecting the best sources ton provide rich data for tour research, This lecture covers how to find the right ones

Here we cover the sources that can be used and referenced by the tool

Get comfortable with how to upload and link sources to Google NotebookLM

Reinforce your learning with this Quiz on Sources

Using the text function is a great part of the tool to drive out insights from your sources. Learn the right prompts to use and how to have a conversation with the tool to drive valuable answers

As you are chatting with the tool, you're going to learn a lot about your chosen subject, the notes function is a great way to save these learnings automatically

Audio Overviews are lively “deep dive” discussions that summarize the key topics in your sources. This is an experimental feature and below are some notes to help you get started:

  • Audio Overviews (including the voices) are AI-generated, so there might be inaccuracies and audio glitches.

  • Audio Overviews are not a comprehensive or objective view of a topic, but simply a reflection of your sources.

  • Audio Overviews are only in English at this moment.

  • It can take several minutes to generate an Audio Overview (feel free to do other things while generation is in progress).

  • You need edit access to a notebook in order to generate or delete an Audio Overview.

  • You can share your feedback on an Audio Overview using the thumbs up and thumbs down buttons.

In this lecture we take a deep dive into a prebuilt notebook for Interview Prep. Let's work together to get a Job at Apple! using the job description, links to articles, talks by Steve Jobs and more to give us the context we need to excel at the interview stage.

As you are chatting, you can trigger the creation of a briefing document, A handy automatic summary of all the sources your have linked to the tool. A great starting place for understanding the subject you're researching as well as for triggering other key questions and queries you can ask

You've watched the videos, now test your knowledge retention with this quick Quiz

You don't have to keep audio overviews to yourself, with this easy function you can share them with anyone in your team

You can now interrupt your Audio Overview to ask a question, interject, or make a request to the hosts!

Here are some notes to get you started:

  • Your voice and transcribed interactions with the hosts will not be stored.

  • Clicking on the share / download buttons will share / download your original Audio Overview. Other users will not be able to interact with your Audio Overview via the share link.

  • There may be a slight delay in starting to play the initial content, after you hit the join button, or after you speak to the hosts.

  • It can take several minutes to generate an Audio Overview (feel free to do other things while generation is in progress).

  • There may be some audio glitches (random speaker switches, third voice, voice glitches).

  • This feature is only available for newly generated Audio Overviews.

Customise your audio overview by creating specific prompts, rules and criteria to make the generated conversation more specific to the answers you're looking for, further saving you time

Studio is great, test your knowledge on how great you think it is too with this quick Quiz!

The notes section is where you're saving your insights, but they can do so much more for you as another time saver, consolidating all the best bits of your learning and propelling your research further

Frequently Asked Questions or FAQ's can be automatically generated to give you another view of your data. rather than a summary of the content the system poses this as questions that you may ask

Accelerate your learning with a study guide, posing essay and quiz questions to help test your knowledge. This is so important as you're not just using the tool to tell you answers but in stead the study guide encourages you to fully learn and absorb it

If you are working with historical information then the timeline is critical to understanding the chronological (date order) of the events

In this lecture we touch upon the various use cases for the tool. This is important because figuring out how the tool will help you in your day to day personnel or professional life will the difference in how much you use it.

In this challenge I ask you to research and prepare for an interview at octopus energy. try to complete your detailed prep in record time with Google NotebookLM

Here we delve into how Google NotebookLM can accelerate your career by using education sources specific to your job role and industry to understand where your knowledge gaps are and how to fill them

Google NotebookLM is made for study and anyone studying anything can benefit from it Here we look at examples of a specific study topic and how the tool can drive our learning forwards

For this challenge, try and wrap your head around roman history, answering the complex extxay questions effortlessly using the tool

In this Use Case we will use Google NotebookLM to Brainstorm how to start an online business for selling digital art designs

Google NotebookLM has limitations currently when it comes to data analysis, but that doesn't mean it cannot do a level of it. In this lecture we look at what it can do and leverage its expertise to pull out data insights

I would love to hear about how you're using the tool! please do share what you're using it for and how it is helping you achieve your goals

Traffic lights

Read about what's good
what should give you pause
and possible dealbreakers
Covers the 2025 updates to Google NotebookLM, ensuring learners are up-to-date with the latest features and capabilities of this AI-driven tool
Teaches how to create AI-driven study guides, briefing documents, and conversational podcasts, which can significantly accelerate learning and research processes
Explores various use cases, such as researching for job interviews, studying for exams, and brainstorming business ideas, demonstrating the tool's versatility across different domains
Includes quizzes and challenges to encourage hands-on experience with Google NotebookLM, reinforcing learning and promoting practical application of the tool's features
Focuses on overcoming the problem of information overload by teaching how to effectively analyze and extract key insights from large volumes of data using Google NotebookLM
Requires learners to have a Google account, which may be a barrier for some users who prefer not to use Google products or services due to privacy concerns

Save this course

Create your own learning path. Save this course to your list so you can find it easily later.
Save

Reviews summary

Master google notebooklm: ai note-taking

According to learners, this course offers a comprehensive guide to mastering Google NotebookLM, with many finding it highly effective for accelerating research and learning. Students particularly praise the clear instruction and bitesized lectures, making the content easy to digest and follow. The inclusion of practical use cases helps demonstrate how to apply the tool in real-world scenarios, such as interview preparation and career development. While the course covers the latest 2025 updates and includes helpful quizzes for reinforcement, some learners feel there could be more emphasis on advanced techniques.
Instructor provides helpful Q&A support.
"Instructor answered my question quickly and thoroughly in the Q&A."
"Support from the instructor in the Q&A section was great."
"Felt comfortable asking questions knowing I'd get a helpful response."
Quizzes aid in learning retention.
"The quizzes added in 2025 really helped reinforce key concepts."
"Appreciated the quizzes after each section to check my understanding."
"Quizzes made sure I was actually learning and not just watching."
Useful experimental feature for summaries.
"The audio summaries are a neat way to grasp content quickly."
"Found the audio overview feature quite handy for reviewing material."
"Sometimes the audio quality isn't perfect, but the feature is cool and adds value."
Instructor explains concepts clearly.
"Instructor was very clear and easy to understand throughout the course."
"The bitesized lectures are perfect for learning at your own pace."
"Well-structured and easy to navigate, making learning enjoyable."
Covers NotebookLM features thoroughly.
"The course covers all the features of NotebookLM extensively."
"Learned everything I needed to know about the tool from this course."
"Provides a deep dive into NotebookLM's capabilities from start to finish."
Demonstrates real-world applications.
"The examples, like interview prep, were incredibly practical and helpful."
"Showed me exactly how to use it for my job and personal projects."
"Great ideas for applying NotebookLM in daily tasks and research."
Could benefit from advanced examples.
"Could use more examples for complex or advanced users already familiar with AI tools."
"Wish there were deeper dives into specific power user techniques."
"Good for beginners, but intermediate users might want a bit more depth."

Activities

Be better prepared before your course. Deepen your understanding during and after it. Supplement your coursework and achieve mastery of the topics covered in Master NotebookLM: The Ultimate in AI NoteTaking (2025) with these activities:
Review AI Fundamentals
Reviewing AI fundamentals will provide a solid foundation for understanding how NotebookLM leverages AI to enhance note-taking and research.
Browse courses on Artificial Intelligence
Show steps
  • Read articles on AI and machine learning.
  • Watch introductory videos on AI concepts.
  • Complete a basic online AI course.
Read 'Deep Learning' by Goodfellow et al.
Reading 'Deep Learning' will provide a deeper understanding of the AI algorithms that power NotebookLM's features.
View Deep Learning on Amazon
Show steps
  • Read the introductory chapters on deep learning.
  • Focus on chapters related to NLP and information retrieval.
  • Take notes on key concepts and algorithms.
Experiment with different source types
Practicing with different source types will help you understand the strengths and weaknesses of each, leading to better source selection for NotebookLM.
Show steps
  • Upload different document formats (PDF, DOCX, TXT).
  • Link to various web pages and articles.
  • Test the tool's performance with each source type.
Four other activities
Expand to see all activities and additional details
Show all seven activities
Summarize key concepts from course lectures
Creating summaries of course lectures will reinforce your understanding of the material and provide a valuable reference for later use.
Show steps
  • Review each lecture and identify key concepts.
  • Write a concise summary of each concept.
  • Organize the summaries into a single document.
Research a topic using NotebookLM
Starting a research project will allow you to apply your knowledge of NotebookLM to a real-world problem and solidify your skills.
Show steps
  • Choose a topic of interest to research.
  • Gather relevant sources using NotebookLM.
  • Analyze the sources and create a summary of your findings.
  • Present your findings in a report or presentation.
Create a NotebookLM tutorial
Creating a tutorial will force you to master the tool and explain its features to others, further solidifying your understanding.
Show steps
  • Choose a specific feature of NotebookLM to focus on.
  • Create a step-by-step guide on how to use the feature.
  • Record a video demonstrating the feature in action.
  • Share your tutorial with others and gather feedback.
Answer questions in online forums
Mentoring others by answering questions will reinforce your knowledge and help you identify areas where you need further learning.
Show steps
  • Find online forums related to NotebookLM.
  • Browse the forums for questions you can answer.
  • Provide clear and concise answers to the questions.

Career center

Learners who complete Master NotebookLM: The Ultimate in AI NoteTaking (2025) will develop knowledge and skills that may be useful to these careers:
Training and Development Specialist
A Training and Development Specialist is responsible for designing and delivering training programs to enhance employees' skills and performance within an organization. This role requires understanding learning methodologies, assessing training needs, and creating engaging content. The course, centered around mastering Google NotebookLM, aligns directly with this role as it teaches learners how to leverage AI to accelerate the process of researching various training topics. Creating study guides, timelines, and briefing documents using Google NotebookLM can streamline the development process, ensuring training programs address the most pertinent information. The course's emphasis on curating ideal sources and creating AI-driven audio overviews can modernize how training content is delivered, making the Training and Development Specialist more efficient and effective.
Librarian
A Librarian manages and curates collections of resources, assists users in finding information, and promotes literacy and learning within a community or institution. This role requires strong organizational skills, knowledge of information resources, and a commitment to serving diverse information needs. The course, focused on mastering Google NotebookLM, directly aligns with the evolving role of the modern librarian, as the tool helps make research more efficient. By learning how to curate ideal sources, librarians can enhance their ability to provide access to accurate and relevant information. The Librarian can use the automatic creation Briefing documents, Timelines, Study Guides and more.
Knowledge Manager
A Knowledge Manager ensures the efficient organization and sharing of information within an organization. This often involves identifying knowledge gaps, curating relevant resources, and developing systems to facilitate knowledge transfer. The course, centered on mastering Google NotebookLM, directly aligns with the work of a Knowledge Manager, as it will allow for the quick creation of briefing documents, timelines, study guides, and more. NotebookLM offers a simple interface to plug in all the content you don't have the time to analyze and then have a conversation with that content to get from it exactly what you need. In particular, understanding the course's lessons on finding the right sources to link to NotebookLM, capturing valuable notes with artificial intelligence, and creating audio podcasts for knowledge dissemination helps build a foundation in the core competencies needed for this role.
Information Architect
An Information Architect organizes and structures information within systems like websites, databases, and software applications to optimize usability and findability. This role demands a strategic approach to information management and a deep understanding of user needs. The course, centered around Google NotebookLM, is quite relevant, as the tool is designed to help users manage and synthesize large volumes of information efficiently. The Information Architect can leverage the tool to categorize and structure information for improved searchability. The curriculum's emphasis on linking sources, capturing valuable notes with AI, and creating study guides helps build the skills needed to excel in this role. The Information Architect role is focused on organizing content and as such is well aligned with this course's features.
Researcher
A Researcher conducts systematic investigations to discover new knowledge, solve problems, or develop new products or theories. This profession typically requires advanced degrees and rigorous methodological expertise. This course helps the researcher by assisting them with researching any topic quickly and effectively, ensuring only the bits the researcher really needs to know are presented to them and allowing them to have a conversation with their own personal AI. NotebookLM can solve the problem of too much data.
Market Research Analyst
A Market Research Analyst studies market conditions to examine potential sales of a product or service. The analyst helps companies understand what products people want, who will buy them, and at what price. The course helps the analyst by helping them to research any topic quickly and effectively, ensuring only the bits you really need to know are presented to you and allowing you to have a conversation with it your own personal AI. This allows the analyst to come up to speed quicker on any topic and be able to provide more timely research.
Curriculum Developer
A Curriculum Developer designs and develops educational materials, ensuring they meet learning objectives and are engaging for students. This role often requires extensive research, analysis of learning theories, and the ability to create structured content. The course provides insights into how AI can streamline research and content creation for any topic. Understanding how to create study guides, timelines, and briefing documents using Google NotebookLM can accelerate the development process. Specifically, the course's focus on curating ideal sources and creating AI-driven audio overviews can revolutionize how learning materials are developed, making the curriculum developer more efficient and effective.
Freelance Writer
A Freelance Writer creates content for various clients, often working on diverse topics and projects. Success in this role requires excellent research skills, adaptability, and the ability to meet tight deadlines. The course may be useful because it covers how to use Google NotebookLM to research any topic quickly and effectively. Freelance writers can improve their research process with Google NotebookLM. The Freelance Writer can also leverage the various use cases that are prepared in the course.
Research Analyst
A Research Analyst gathers, analyzes, and interprets data to provide insights and recommendations to organizations or clients. The work often involves conducting literature reviews, performing statistical analysis, and preparing reports. This course, focused on mastering Google NotebookLM, may be useful to a Research Analyst because it teaches learners how to leverage AI to accelerate the process of researching any topic and identifying the most critical information quickly. Creating briefing documents or conversational podcasts that summarize key findings allows the analyst to rapidly digest key information. A Research Analyst could leverage the use case examples that help to learn the capabilities of the tool.
Technical Writer
A Technical Writer creates clear and concise documentation for technical products or services. The work involves understanding complex technical concepts and translating them into user-friendly guides and manuals. The course may be useful for Technical Writers, as being able to link almost any web source will give the Technical Writer their own AI companion that they can ask questions to learn precisely what they need to know. Learning how to create briefing documents documents may be useful in this role, helping writers become more efficient in their work.
Competitive Intelligence Analyst
A Competitive Intelligence Analyst researches and analyzes information about competitors, market trends, and the overall business environment to advise organizations on strategic decisions. This work involves extensive research and critical evaluation of sources. The course may be useful for competitive intelligence analysts because it teaches how to find the right sources, link sources, create study guides, timelines, and briefing documents, all of which help accelerate research. The Competitive Intelligence Analyst is responsible for understanding market conditions and as such may accelerate their workflow with the use of a tool such as NotebookLM.
Intelligence Analyst
An Intelligence Analyst gathers information from various sources to assess threats, risks, and opportunities for governments, organizations, or businesses. This role requires strong analytical and critical thinking skills. The course, focused on mastering Google NotebookLM, may be useful, as it teaches the skills to accelerate the learning of any topic. Understanding how to customize the AI overview to get the answers needed is critical to success in this role. Using Google NotebookLM addresses the problem of too much information and data.
Content Strategist
A Content Strategist plans, develops, and manages content to achieve specific business goals. This often involves understanding target audiences, crafting messaging, and optimizing content for various platforms. The course may be helpful for Content Strategists, as they might use Google NotebookLM to research topics quickly and effectively. Specifically, learning how to create an AI-driven and conversational audio overview of content could offer innovative ways to engage audiences. A Content Strategist can leverage the use case examples that help to learn the capabilities of the tool.
Data Scientist
A Data Scientist analyzes large datasets to extract meaningful insights and develop data-driven solutions for organizations. This usually requires advanced degrees. While this course may not directly replace formal data science training, understanding the principles of NotebookLM may be useful in the early stages of a research project. The tool can help to efficiently summarize key research papers or even organize notes from online courses related to data science.
Data Architect
A Data Architect designs and implements systems for storing and managing data. They ensure data is accessible, secure, and optimized for analysis. This role often requires advanced degrees in computer science or a related field. This course may be useful to help the Data Architect better understand how to streamline the process of researching topics and identifying the most critical information quickly. One who is in this role, with many responsibilities, can use NotebookLM to get up to speed on any subject in short order.

Reading list

We've selected one books that we think will supplement your learning. Use these to develop background knowledge, enrich your coursework, and gain a deeper understanding of the topics covered in Master NotebookLM: The Ultimate in AI NoteTaking (2025).
Provides a comprehensive overview of deep learning techniques, which are the foundation of many AI tools like NotebookLM. It offers a deeper understanding of the algorithms and models used for natural language processing and information retrieval. While not required, reading this book will give you a strong theoretical understanding of the AI behind NotebookLM. It is commonly used as a textbook in university courses.

Share

Help others find this course page by sharing it with your friends and followers:

Similar courses

Similar courses are unavailable at this time. Please try again later.
Our mission

OpenCourser helps millions of learners each year. People visit us to learn workspace skills, ace their exams, and nurture their curiosity.

Our extensive catalog contains over 50,000 courses and twice as many books. Browse by search, by topic, or even by career interests. We'll match you to the right resources quickly.

Find this site helpful? Tell a friend about us.

Affiliate disclosure

We're supported by our community of learners. When you purchase or subscribe to courses and programs or purchase books, we may earn a commission from our partners.

Your purchases help us maintain our catalog and keep our servers humming without ads.

Thank you for supporting OpenCourser.

© 2016 - 2025 OpenCourser