Yes, you can get 12 months of Gemini Advanced with older Chromebook Plus models

Since last week I’ve been having trouble with a specific part of Google’s new announcements around Chromebook Plus and ChromeOS: offering Google One AI Premium (including Gemini Advanced) for free to users who purchase a new Chromebook Plus model.

With a presentation that drove home the idea that AI shouldn’t be behind an expensive paywall, I was super excited to see it Google is offering Gemini Advanced completely free to Chromebook Plus users for 12 months. It solidified and amplified the points they were making on stage and was one of the things I couldn’t wait to tell people about.

You always understand the small print

But after the presentation and during the past week, I asked questions. What about Chromebook Plus models purchased a month ago? A week ago? 3 months ago? What about all those devices that aren’t Chromebook Plus branded but have all the Chromebook Plus upgrades? How does this free offer expand in a way that doesn’t deter many new users by simply purchasing a Chromebook Plus model a few weeks or months ago?

And the first answers to those questions weren’t great, and they came in the form of the new Chromebook Perk which is now prominently displayed on the Chromebook Perks page. If you dig a little, there’s some rather unsavory language to greet you, and when I read it, my initial elation about this new feature literally turned to fear. How on earth were we going to explain this to all the people we’ve encouraged to buy Chromebook Plus models in recent months?

We tested it and the offer works for older devices

So in light of this, I wanted to try it out before I ranted at length about all this. I took a few non-branded Chromebook Plus models we have in the office and used a few non-work email accounts to try to monetize the offer. And it worked for me on 3 devices on 3 email addresses!

Then I messaged Joe and had him try the HP Dragonfly Pro Chromebook, and we hit a roadblock. I also had a friend of mine at the office try it out on his Chromebook Plus model that he bought a few months ago. Again, it was a no-go and the Perks page simply said – after running checks – that the deal had expired. So I thought maybe it was a fluke that the few I had success with ever worked at all.

But I wasn’t ready to give up yet. So with my friend’s approval, we ran a Powerwash on his device, went through the new OOBE setup we talked about yesterday, and this time the benefit worked! An update was performed during installation, and although I think he was already using ChromeOS 125, his device might not.

Anyway, an update to 125 and a Powerwash helped, so I instructed Joe to do the same. And it worked. And to wrap up the theory, I went to our private Chrome Unboxed Plus Discord community (more on that at the bottom of this post) and asked those fine folks to try this method if they were able to. And the The resounding result is that almost everyone who updated, Powerwashed, and tried to redeem the Gemini Perk on their Chromebook Plus got it – regardless of purchase date!

There are a few who haven’t gotten this working yet, but they are outside the US. Both of their countries are on the approved list in the fine print, so it should work; but I still don’t know why it isn’t like that now. however, the big majority of those who have tried this method have had success, and chances are you could too.

Simply backup your local files, get updated to ChromeOS 125, and then proceed to Powerwash your Chromebook. Once you’ve reset everything, head over to the Chromebook Perks page, click on the big Gemini offer at the top and hopefully you can take advantage of this pretty awesome offer.

But do it sooner rather than later! There are always layers to these types of offers, and there may be deeper reasons why Google didn’t want to allow this on older Chromebook Plus devices. While I strongly disagree with that idea, I have no idea how long this window will remain open. Do not miss it!