I tried a tool from NotebookLM’s creators that makes a daily podcast out of my inbox and calendar, and it’s game-changing

Google launched NotebookLM as an experimental project under the code name "Project Tailwind" in 2023. It eventually made it out of the experimental phase and went viral for its Audio Overviews feature.

Interestingly, some of the key people behind the development of the tool ended up leaving Google in December 2024 to launch their own startup, Huxe. They recently dropped their first AI tool, and I took it for a spin, and...it's game-changing. Frankly, I'm not even surprised — I expected no less from minds that helped bring NotebookLM to life.

What is Huxe?

The smartest thing you’ll listen to all day

Huxe is a startup founded by:

• Raiza Martin, former team lead of Google’s NotebookLM
• Jason Spielman, former design lead of NotebookLM
• Stephen Hughes, ex–Google software engineer

Huxe publicly announced its first product, an AI-powered personalized audio service also called Huxe, on June 5th 2025. It isn’t widely available yet, as it's still in its early access stage. Thankfully, users can get in through a code that the Huxe team shares via Discord and their social media channels.

Huxe is built around the concept of personalized intelligence — an AI that's essentially made just for you. It learns from your behavior and adapts dynamically over time. By connecting to sources like your calendar and email, Huxe generates a personalized feed of spoken content tailored to your day. Huxe is now available on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. The mobile app has launched with two core features (which I’ll dive into below): Daily Briefing and DeepCast.

The Daily Audio Briefing feature turns your day into a short podcast

Built from your schedule, inbox, and interests

If you've tried NotebookLM before, chances are you've used the Audio Overviews feature. Huxe offers a Daily Audio Briefing that feels like a more personal, real-time version of Audio Overviews tailored to your schedule, inbox, and interests.

One of Huxe's co-founders told Business Insider that while they were building NotebookLM, they realized that people actually learn best through audio instead of text. I’ve found NotebookLM’s Audio Overviews to be a game-changer for both my studies and day-to-day life, so I completely agree with that insight.

Daily Audio Briefing securely accesses your calendar, email, and the latest news, and then uses all of it to deliver a fresh, personalized rundown. Once you get access to the app, you'll be given the option to connect your Google Calendar and Gmail. Huxe uses the former to review your upcoming events, and the latter to summarize key emails and tasks.

You’ll then be asked to select up to five topics for your daily briefing from a list of options like Technology, Current Events, Business, Sports, Education, and more. I chose Technology, Entertainment, Travel, Education, and Productivity.

The briefing began with the hosts greeting me, letting me know what time it was and what the weather was like, and then running through my calendar first. When I tested it, I had a work shift later that day and a Teams call. Nothing else was scheduled on my calendar since it was a relatively lightweight day, so the hosts moved on to my email inbox and walked me through my unread emails. Huxe displayed the calendar events and email subject lines the hosts talked about during the briefing on-screen as well.

It let me know that I had a few press releases in my inbox, two Google Meet invites, notifications from Asana and Trello, and even a Google security alert. It then ran through the top headlines of the day, and despite it being my first time ever using the tool, the headlines it picked were right up my alley. It even mentioned a story I had bookmarked to read later!

Of course, there are times when a topic doesn’t exactly resonate with me. Thankfully, right below the card showing the headline and summary bullets, there’s a Skip this topic button. And if something does catch my attention, there’s also a Tell me more button.

What’s great is that you can interrupt the hosts while they’re talking by tapping the Tap and hold to speak button to share feedback or ask questions. The best part? Huxe remembers your input and considers it moving forward.

What I’ve always loved about NotebookLM’s Audio Overviews is how natural they sound. The hosts never have that robotic tone, and they always sneak in a bit of witty humor. Huxe’s Daily Briefing had the same charm. For instance, at the beginning of the briefing, when the hosts were discussing the weather, one of them said, “Classic June evening, if you ask me.”

The podcast wasn’t just a quick five-minute recap either. Instead, it was an in-depth overview that ran over 20 minutes. Ever since I tried it, I’ve been listening to one while having breakfast instead of checking my calendar or email first thing in the morning, or scrolling through TikTok. When I head back to university after the summer, I know exactly what I’ll be listening to during my commute.

Huxe's DeepCast is perfect for when I'm feeling curious

A smarter, on-demand version of NotebookLM’s Audio Overviews

Huxe has another feature called DeepCast, which can create a personalized and interactive audio overview for you on a topic or query of your choice. All you need to do is let Huxe know what you'd like to hear about. When I tried it, it suggested the following four topics:

• Why do cats knock things over?
• What are the best new AI tools in tech?
• Explain VC fundraising like I'm 5
• Give me an encouraging start to a busy day

Of course, you can type in any topic you'd like to hear about, including real-time ones. So, for example, if you couldn't tune in and watch WWDC 2025 when it was going on, you could just type "WWDC 2025 announcements" into Huxe, and it would research trusted sources in real time and create an informative podcast.

I asked Huxe to cook up a Deep Dive for "different ways people are using NotebookLM," and the podcast... was fantastic. It generated an AI-generated cover image with four different people using their laptops, which I think added a unique touch. The Deep Dive began with an introduction about NotebookLM, some statistics about it, and of course, how different people are using it.

Like with the Daily Audio Briefing, you can tap the Tap and hold to speak button to ask questions or share feedback while listening. You’ll also find all your generated DeepCast topics saved in a dedicated tab, making it easy to revisit them later.

What makes Huxe's DeepCast different from NotebookLM's Audio Overviews is that it researches sources in real time.

On the other hand, NotebookLM uses sources you've uploaded to generate audio summaries. Similar to the Daily Briefing, the DeepCast was fun to listen to, and it didn’t sound robotic at all.

If you like NotebookLM, you’ll love Huxe

I'm not exaggerating when I say that Huxe is the next big AI tool. And if you've been a big NotebookLM fan, especially of its Audio Overviews feature, you'll absolutely fall in love with Huxe like I have.

Keep in mind that Huxe is in no way a NotebookLM competitor. Huxe is more about delivering real-time, personalized audio content, while NotebookLM focuses on helping you interact with and learn from documents you've already uploaded. If anything, they actually complement each other really well.