Google Docs eliminates page breaks, uses Smart Canvas to get new document summaries

Google Workspace enhances its smart canvas platform with new productivity features.

what you need to know

• Google has announced a new Smart Canvas feature for Google Docs.
• Productivity Services now allows you to add brief overviews to shared documents via content summaries.
• Google Docs also now includes a new pageless format that eliminates traditional page boundaries in documents.

Since releasing its Smart Canvas platform to the best laptops late last year, Google has made some beneficial improvements to it, such as the ability to use the universal @ menu to insert various types of rich content into your documents. The search giant is now pushing some new updates to Smart Canvas designed to make it easier to work on shared documents at the same time.

Smart Canvas now includes the ability to summarize documents in Google Docs. This feature allows you to include useful content overviews in your document to help readers quickly understand what it contains.

There are two ways to insert excerpts in a document, depending on your version of Google Workspace. All Workspace, legacy G Suite Basic, and G Suite Business customers can manually add summaries.

Also, auto-generated summaries are available for Workspace Essentials, Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Plus, Frontline, and Nonprofits tiers. AI-generated recommendations are automatically created when you click the “Summary” box.

Additionally, Google has made it easier to work with wide tables and large images by introducing a pageless format for Docs. This feature eliminates the traditional page breaks and margins in Docs, allowing users to create documents without regard to page limitations. Of course, you can always return to the paginated format if you prefer the traditional view.

The pageless format is available to all Workspace customers and legacy G Suite Basic and Business users. These features are expected to be available to everyone within the next two weeks.