- OpenAI has announced that it’s building a new AI-enabled search engine called SearchGPT.
- It works the same way as ChatGPT – you ask it a question and it will give you a real-time answer along with links to the original sources.
- The tool is currently under testing and is available only to a few select users. Depending on their feedback, it will get integrated with ChatGPT soon.
On Thursday, OpenAI announced that it’s working on a new AI-enabled search engine called SearchGPT. The underlying technology is similar to the one used in ChatGPT with the only difference being that SearchGPT will use real-time information from the web.
Using the tool will be no different.
- Users can ask their questions the same way they enter their queries on ChatGPT and the tool will provide them with relevant answers.
- It will also provide links to the information source.
- There will also be a sidebar with 10 additional links in case the user wants more options.
In a demo, OpenAI gave us a glimpse of how it will work. For example, they asked the tool about the “best tomatoes to grow in Minnesota” and it responded with a detailed answer on the different varieties of tomatoes along with links to reputed sites like “The Garden Magazine” and “The Gardening Dad.”
However, the tool also made a mistake during the demo. A user asked about music festivals in a town in North Carolina, in August. The tool did answer it but got the dates wrong.
this isn’t a big deal since AI tools are often prone to mistakes, especially in the early stages. Hopefully, OpenAI will fix these issues before launching it publicly.
SearchGPT is still at a very early stage of testing and is only available to a limited number of users. Based on their feedback, it might be integrated with ChatGPT soon.
If everything goes as planned, OpenAI might finally be able to take on its biggest tech rival, Google. It might also give Bing, which is already struggling to compete with Google, a run for its money.
There were rumors about OpenAI working on a search engine in early May. However, Sam Altman had refuted such claims and called them baseless. However, as it has turned out, these rumors were indeed true.
Why Is OpenAI Investing in a Search Engine?
Considering that Google’s search engine has been unbeatable for years, one might wonder why OpenAI is taking the risk to invest in a search engine.
Well, innovation is limitless. In a blog post, OpenAI wrote that the current way of searching is too inconvenient and it takes multiple search attempts to find the relevant links. SearchGPT aims to solve that.
‘We believe that by enhancing the conversational capabilities of our models with real-time information from the web, finding what you’re looking for can be faster and easier’ – OpenAI
The other reason might be the growing competition from Google in the AI sector. We all know that OpenAI is responsible for starting the AI boom. However, Google has been making considerable progress and is not much behind OpenAI.
Just this May, it added a new AI-generated feature that creates summaries of the top search results, called AI Overview. Although the feature was pulled back after it generated a string of inaccurate summaries, it was enough to give the hint that OpenAI has a new rival.
So if Google can try to get ahead in the AI industry, there’s no reason why OpenAI can’t try its luck in the search engine industry.