Gemini Student Offer: 1 Year of AI Plus Free, Last Date

“Unless cancelled earlier, Google AI Plus will automatically charge ₹399/month after the trial ends,” reads the fine print at the foot of Google’s India student page (read logged out from India, 31 October 2026). The Gemini student offer above that line is one year of Google AI Plus at no cost for university students aged 18 and over who verify through SheerID, and it must be redeemed by 31 December 2026.

The same page carries a second line worth reading before you claim: “Eligibility must be verified each year to maintain access.” Both lines, and the redeem-by date, come from that page, which I read after Cloudflare’s trace returned loc=IN; the account and age rules are in Google’s offer terms, last updated 19 August 2026.

Treat this as a 12-month AI Plus trial with a rupee bill attached, rather than the free AI Pro year that July 2025 headlines still describe, and decide on the day you claim whether you will cancel before month 13.

What Is the Gemini Student Offer?

The Gemini student offer in India is a one-year Google AI Plus plan at no cost: 400 GB of storage, 2x usage limits and Gemini Omni. It is open to university students aged 18+ who verify through SheerID on a personal Google Account. Redeem by 31 December 2026; after 12 months it charges ₹399 a month unless you cancel.

Google’s rules for it, read on 31 October 2026:

Add-ons are excluded too: Google One Help says upgraded storage (“2 TB for Google AI Plus”) and recurring add-ons “are unavailable with a Google One student offer”. Prices, limits and plan contents change, so check the student page before you claim.

How to Claim Google’s Student Plan

Google One Help gives these steps, and the “Claim a student plan at no cost” button on the India student page links to the same address:

1. Go to one.google.com/ai-student. Logged out, it redirected me to a Google sign-in page on 31 October 2026.
2. Sign in to the personal Google Account you want the plan on, and stay on that account until the end.
3. Select the student offer.
4. Verify your student status through SheerID when asked.
5. Complete the subscription flow, adding a form of payment if the account has none.

SheerID’s student FAQ lists what it asks for: your full school name, your “First and last name, as shown on school records”, your date of birth and a “School or personal email address”. If it asks for proof, it wants a school-issued document showing your name, school name and a “Date showing current enrollment”, such as a “School ID card with expiration date”, a “Class schedule” or a “Tuition receipt”.

Gemini Student Offer Last Date: 31 December 2026

The last date to redeem is 31 December 2026, which was 61 days after my check on 31 October 2026. The offer terms add that it is “Available for a limited time”, so Google can end it before that date.

Because the 12 months run from the day you redeem, your claim date sets your renewal date. My arithmetic from the terms:

Google does not print an exact end day, so treat these dates as approximate.

2025 AI Pro Trial vs the 2026 AI Plus Plan

Search for the offer and you still get July 2025 stories about free AI Pro, such as Business Today’s “Students in India can get free Gemini AI Pro plan”, published on 16 July 2025. Those stories describe an earlier offer. Google’s own pages, side by side:

A second source of the AI Pro wording is Google’s own Back to School 2026 post of 19 August 2026. It gives “one year free of Google AI Pro” to eligible college students “in the U.S.”, while “Eligible college students outside the U.S. can access Google AI Plus, free of charge”. A student in India gets the second sentence.

Two more points from the 2026 pages:

• The age is 18. An Entrepreneur India article of 21 August 2026 says students “must be at least 16 years old”, but Google’s offer terms say “Be 18 years of age or older”.
• Holders of the 2025 trial are not shut out. The India student page says “students whose 2025 AI Pro trial has expired can qualify”.

AI Plus is the tier below AI Pro, and Google’s own pages disagree on whether it reaches the Pro model. The model-by-model table is in my Internshala post, linked in the route table below. If you plan to code in Google Antigravity, AI Plus keeps the free tier’s weekly quota refresh there, and my look at Antigravity quotas by Google plan shows which plans refresh every five hours.

Gemini Student Offer Not Working or Not Eligible: Google’s Causes

Every cause below is one Google or SheerID states. The India student page sends trouble to Google One Help, and that article names one error by its cause: “you may be signed in with a different Google Account to the one that you were using before you verified your student status.” The fix it gives is to sign in and claim “with the Google Account that you were using when you first selected a student offer and got sent to SheerID.”

The other blocks, checked on 31 October 2026:

• Age under 18. The terms require “18 years of age or older”, and Google’s India plan page says Google AI plans “are only available for ages 18+”.
• School-issued Workspace for Education account. The terms say the offer is not available on it; use a personal Google Account.
• Family group membership. Google One Help excludes “Family group members, unless they leave their shared plan first.”
• Google One through a third party. The terms exclude “a discounted Pixel bundle subscriber” and anyone with “a Google One subscription through a third party or affiliate such as Google Fi”; Google One Help adds “Pixel Pass”.
• Supervised account. “You also do not qualify if you have a supervised Google Account.”
• An earlier upgrade out of the trial. “If you upgrade to a paid membership from the 12-month trial, you will not be eligible for the trial offer again.”
• No qualifying payment method. The terms ask for “a Google Payments account with a qualifying form of payment at sign-up”.
• No SheerID option that fits. Its FAQ says “If on the form you don’t see an option that is a close fit, then that means you unfortunately are not eligible for this offer.”
• A failed purchase after SheerID verifies you. SheerID says it “only handles the verification process” and points you to “the brand’s customer support”.
• An institution in an excluded country. Google One Help requires a student “at a higher education institution in a country or region where Google AI Plus is available (excluding Albania, Bolivia, Canada, Hong Kong, Macau, Tunisia and the United States).”

Before you claim, two switching rules can cost you something you already have:

The terms end on a catch-all: “Google reserves the right to determine eligibility at its sole discretion.”

After 12 Months: ₹399 a Month, Cancelling and Storage

When the Offer Period ends, the terms say your payment method “will be automatically charged the standard monthly subscription price for the applicable plan included in your Offer for your country, until you cancel your subscription”, except where the law requires consent. For India the student page puts that at ₹399 a month, and Google One Help says “You will be notified ahead of the upcoming change.” To avoid the charge, the terms say “you must cancel before the end of the Offer Period.”

Google One Help’s cancel article gives these steps on a computer:

1. Go to Google One.
2. Click Settings, then Cancel membership.
3. Click Cancel membership again to confirm.

On an Android phone, the same article says to open the Google One app, tap Menu, then Settings, then Cancel membership.

What cancelling does:

On re-verification, Google’s pages differ. The India student page says “Eligibility must be verified each year to maintain access”, and the terms make eligibility a condition “to retain access for the whole Offer Period”. Google One Help’s question “Do I need to reverify with SheerID?” answers yes “if you have claimed a Google AI Pro student offer”, “usually every 12 months, for up to four consecutive years”, and does not name the AI Plus trial. The offer terms contain no re-verification date. Keep your student email working for the whole year.

If you would rather pay for something else in month 13, my ChatGPT Go and Google AI Plus comparison by rupee tier sets the two side by side. Perplexity has no free student plan in India: its Education Pro is a discount for verified students and educators, as my breakdown of Perplexity’s offers for Indian users shows.

Which Student Route Is Yours?

If SheerID verifies you and you are 18 or older, Google’s own plan is the route: redeem it before 31 December 2026. Every other case, as of 31 October 2026:

Claim the Gemini Student Offer With a Month-12 Plan

Google’s plan gives a verified student 12 months of AI Plus, then ₹399 a month unless cancelled. Claim it on one personal account before 31 December 2026, note the redemption date, and decide then whether you will cancel or pay.

Set a calendar reminder for a week before month 12 ends.