Google CEO Sundar Pichai says artificial intelligence influences almost every part of the company's coding process, but believes fully self-improving AI systems remain a distant prospect.
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Speaking on the Big Technology Podcast with Alex Kantrowitz, Pichai said Google's researchers increasingly use AI agents to develop new models. However, humans remain closely involved, Business Insider reported.
Google’s push towards self-improving AI
"We are pretty far from the end state of RSI," Pichai said, referring to recursive self-improvement, in which AI systems contribute to developing improved versions of themselves.
"The right way to describe it is, you have RSI loops along with AI researchers in various aspects of model development. I would say you almost have agents helping AI researchers, in some automated way, work together to build these models."
Pichai expects this collaboration to progress into 2027, although he did not suggest fully autonomous AI development was imminent.
His remarks follow a more optimistic assessment from Google cofounder Sergey Brin earlier this month. Discussing the company's Flash models and Gemini 4, Brin said Google was "starting to get onto that RSI treadmill."
"And now our researchers and the model work hand in hand to make the next version of the model," Brin said.
Business Insider previously reported that Brin has become more involved in Gemini's development, pushing to direct resources towards recursive self-improvement.
Meanwhile, a Gladstone AI report published this month said most researchers interviewed, including those from Anthropic and DeepMind, expected RSI to emerge within three to 12 months. The prediction, however, remains uncertain.
AI changes how Google writes code
Pichai also discussed AI's growing role in Google's software development. In April, the company said AI generated 75% of its new code. According to Pichai, that figure no longer captures the technology's influence.
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"That number in our world today is like meaningless in the sense that every part of code we now touch is influenced by AI deeply," he said.
Pichai said Gemini 4 Argon would help engineers tackle harder problems. He also cited a one-third reduction in code rollbacks, which occur when developers restore an earlier software version following bugs or other issues.
"And so I think people are writing code more productively, and better code with it," he said.
In a separate appearance on the Sources podcast, Pichai revealed that he also uses AI to follow Google's model development and internal discussions.