Hi Reader,

Last week, I invited you to help me test Google's Data Science Agent in Colab, which promises to automate your data analysis.

Does it live up to that promise? Let's find out! 👇

Sponsored by: Morning Brew​ Business news you’ll actually enjoy Join 4M+ professionals who start their day with Morning Brew—a free daily newsletter that makes business, tech, and finance news genuinely enjoyable to read and hard to forget. Each morning, it breaks down complex stories in plain English—cutting through the noise with sharp insights and just enough wit to keep you engaged. In under 5 minutes, you’ll be up to speed on what matters most to your career and the world around you—all before you’ve finished your morning coffee. Try it for free

​

🔢 How to use Data Science Agent in Colab:

Before we get to the results, here's a recap of how it works:

1. You open a blank Colab notebook.
2. You upload a data file.
3. You describe what analysis you want done.
4. Gemini does the analysis for you.

The interface is a bit confusing, so I recorded a short video (no audio) to help you get started.

🎯 Does it do a good job with the analysis?

Here's what tester #1 said:

Tester #2:

Tester #3:

👉 Here are my takeaways:

After reviewing the Colab notebooks shared by testers and testing it myself, here's my overall conclusion:

Data Science Agent is only useful if you are able to evaluate whether the steps it takes are correct. It will come up with a plan and write the code to execute that plan, but you still need to know enough to assess:

• Is it including all of the steps that are necessary to solve this problem?
• Is it making reasonable assumptions?
• Is it ignoring any relevant factors?
• Is the code it writes in alignment with the stated goal?

As such, Data Science Agent is most useful for those who could already complete the analysis on their own, but just want help in order to execute the analysis faster.

Thus if you use Data Science Agent without sufficient expertise, you run the risk of performing a misleading (or incorrect) analysis!

See you Friday! 👋

If you enjoyed this week's tip, please considering sharing it with a friend!

I'll be back in your inbox on Friday to share the top AI news of the week.

- Kevin

P.S. My favorite AI-generated video so far 😂