Google Reveals ‘Nano Banana’ AI Image Editor in Gemini
It could help you transform photos with simple prompts while keeping likeness intact.
In the past few weeks, the internet has been buzzing about something called Nano Banana. It sounded like a meme until Google CEO Sundar Pichai dropped three banana emojis on X (formerly Twitter) last night, confirming that the codename belongs to Google’s new AI model.
Officially, it’s called Gemini 2.5 Flash Image—a photo editor that promises to make AI edits smarter, sharper, and less uncanny.
To prove how it works, Pichai decided to test it out on his dog, Jeffree, in honour of International Dog Day. He shared a string of hilarious edits showing Jeffree as a surfer, cowboy, superhero, and chef. From the images, we can see that Jeffree still looked pretty much the same in every single picture.
That attention to likeness is likely the pitch for this new model: no more AI photos where your pet, friend, or selfie comes out looking “almost-but-not-quite” real.
Our image editing model is now rolling out in @Geminiapp - and yes, it’s 🍌🍌. Top of @lmarena’s image edit leaderboard, it’s especially good at maintaining likeness across different contexts. Check out a few of my dog Jeffree in honor of International Dog Day - though don’t let… pic.twitter.com/8Y45DawZBc
— Sundar Pichai (@sundarpichai) August 26, 2025
The model, now rolling out globally in the Gemini app (free and paid), can stack edits step by step, remix textures across photos, blend images into one, and even spin your edits into short animated clips. Google calls it an image editor; in practice, it feels like a creative playground.
And unlike rivals like Adobe Firefly and Midjourney that hide advanced editing tools behind paywalls, Google’s pushing this one wide—watermarking every output with visible and invisible tags, while also offering the tech to developers through its API, AI Studio, and Vertex AI for just four cents per image or $30 per million output tokens.
That pricing could matter for startups, designers, and marketing teams in emerging markets experimenting with AI workflows.
So yes, Nano Banana might sound like a joke. But for Google, it’s a serious attempt to make Gemini a tool you’ll actually use, and one that keeps it in the fight against Adobe, OpenAI, and MidJourney in the race to own AI creativity.
Kelechi Edeh
