While there aren’t many tools I genuinely end up using every single day, NotebookLM is one of the rare exceptions. I know, I know — opening something that’s marketed as a research assistant multiple times a day (usually for non-research tasks) sounds odd. But hear me out: the way NotebookLM lets you work with sources you’ve curated and uploaded yourself makes it the easiest, most natural way to slot AI into my workflow.

Given just how much I use it (and write about it), I also tend to interact with a lot of fellow NotebookLM users. It’s a great way to discover new tricks, push the tool beyond what it looks like it can do, and see how other people are fitting it into their routines. That's also exactly how I realized something surprising: most people barely touch its customization features. If you, too, fall within that category, just trust me on this: you’re leaving so much potential on the table.

Ignoring these features is likely why NotebookLM feels underwhelming

It’s not NotebookLM, it’s how you’re using it

Here's how 99% of people start with NotebookLM: they create a new notebook, throw in a handful of sources, and generate one of the Studio outputs (typically Audio Overviews, since that's NotebookLM's most viral feature). And while they find the output impressive the first few times they try it, they eventually notice a pattern in how it’s structured, and the output begins sounding monotonous.

Now, at the end of the day, NotebookLM is powered by AI. AI works on patterns. So if you don't give the tool a direction to work with, it's going to default to the same familiar structure every single time. Before you know it, every podcast begins sounding monotonous and like a predictable template — even when the content the hosts are discussing is completely different.

That's precisely why so many people walk away thinking NotebookLM is repetitive or bland. The longer you treat it as a glorified summarization tool, the quicker you’ll walk away thinking it doesn’t really do much. The real magic begins when you start putting a bit of effort into giving the tool direction, and that's exactly where all of NotebookLM's customization features come in.

NotebookLM lets you customize nearly all its Studio outputs

Your outputs, your rules

When you look over at the Studio panel when you open a NotebookLM notebook, you'll currently notice a pencil icon next to the following tiles: Audio Overview, Video Overview, Flashcards, Quiz, Infographics, Slide Deck, and Data Table. While simply hitting the tile button automatically generates an output, clicking the pencil icon opens up customization options that let you guide how the output is structured.

Now, the exact options for each output vary (since all of these features generate different types of content). For instance, with Audio Overviews, you can choose to generate a discussion of shorter or longer length, rather than the default.

Similarly, with Flashcards and Quizzes, you can select the number of cards you want to generate as well as the difficulty level — easy, medium (default), or hard. For Slide Decks, you can choose if you'd like a short deck or the default.

Finally, before you generate an Infographic, you can choose if you'd like Landscape, Portrait, or Square orientation, and the level of detail from Concise, Standard, or Detailed.

With some Studio outputs, you can also choose a "format":

• Slide Decks: Detailed Deck or Presenter Slides
• Video Overview: Classic, Whiteboard, Kawaii, Anime, Watercooler, Retro Print, Heritage, Paper-craft, or Custom
• Audio Overview: Deep Dive, Brief, Critique, or Debate
• Report: Briefing Doc, Study Guide, Blog Post, or Create Your Own

While all these individual options vary from feature to feature, one customization feature you'll find across all of these outputs is the ability to add a custom prompt. Adding a custom prompt lets you specify the angle, tone, or emphasis you want, effectively guiding the AI to produce content that fits your workflow and intentions.

For instance, I used NotebookLM to create a Spotify Wrapped-like Finance Recap right before the year ended. Had I simply hit Slide Deck, I'd have a very basic presentation deck with my bank statements broken down. But given I had a very specific vision, I entered an extremely detailed prompt where I broke down exactly what I wanted on each slide. As with any AI tool, the more precise your prompts are, the closer the output will align with what you have in mind.

You can also customize how NotebookLM responds to you

Make it respond the way you actually want

In addition to being able to customize the outputs you generate when using NotebookLM, Google also added a feature that lets you customize how the AI responds to you in the Chat panel. To do so, all you need to do is hit the Configure notebook option in the Chat panel. Here, you'll find two options: Define your conversational goal, style, or role and Choose your response length.

The latter is broken down into three parts: Default, Learning Guide, and Custom. Learning Guide is similar to ChatGPT's Study mode and is perfect if you use NotebookLM for studying. The Custom option, on the other hand, lets you enter a custom prompt and effectively turn NotebookLM into any role you want! A tutor, a personal assistant, a subway surfer brainrot tutor — anything. The options are quite literally endless.

My only question is: why aren’t you taking full advantage of NotebookLM?

If you aren't taking advantage of NotebookLM's customization features and aren't making it work for you, you're missing out big time. Just try it once, and you'll immediately see how much more useful the tool can be.