ChatGPT maker, OpenAI, is moving to the Google-dominated terrain as it launches a search tool called SearchGPT as an alternative to Google search.
OpenAI and Google are already the top contenders in the Artificial Intelligence (AI) space with ChatGPT and Gemini trying to win more users.
Announcing the launch of the tool, OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman said the company wanted to make search better than it is currently.
“We think there is room to make search much better than it is today. We are launching a new prototype called SearchGPT. We will learn from the prototype, make it better, and then integrate the tech into ChatGPT to make it real-time and maximally helpful,” Altman said in a post on X.
Competition with Microsoft’s Bing
The launch of SearchGPT announced on Thursday, also places the AI giant in competition with its largest backer Microsoft’s Bing search, and emerging services such as Perplexity — a search-focused AI chatbot firm backed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and semiconductor giant Nvidia.
OpenAI said it has opened sign-ups for the new tool, which is currently in the prototype stage and is being tested with a small group of users and publishers.
“Getting answers on the web can take a lot of effort, often requiring multiple attempts to get relevant results. 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 stated in a post on its website urging users to sign up to be on the waitlist for the tool.
Google’s search dominance
According to web analytics firm Statcounter, Google dominates the search engine market with a 91.05% share as of June. Microsoft’s Bing controls only 3.74% of the market, while Yandex and Yahoo Search account for 1.44% and 1.26% share of the market respectively.
Major search engines have been trying to integrate AI into search since ChatGPT first launched in November 2022. Microsoft, through its early investment, adopted OpenAI technology for its Bing search engine, while Google rolled out AI-powered summaries for the wider public at its developer conference in May.
Meanwhile, the launch of OpenAI’s SearchGPT coincided with Google’s announcement of an upgrade to free-tier experience to Gemini 1.5 Flash for quicker and more helpful responses.
According to Google, with Gemini 1.5 Flash, users would notice across-the-board improvements in quality and latency, with especially noticeable improvements in reasoning and image understanding.
“And just like we greatly expanded the context window of Gemini Advanced, we’re quadrupling Gemini’s to 32K tokens. That means you can have longer back-and-forth conversations and ask Gemini more complex questions — all free of charge,” the company stated in an announcement on Thursday.
What you should know
OpenAI and Google have been at the forefront of the AI revolution. The two companies are pushing hard to win a larger share of the market through their respective chatbots ChatGPT and Gemini, formerly known as Bard.
Elon Musk’s xAI is also coming up strong to wrestle market share from Google and OpenAI. In its bid to attract more users to its AI tool, Grok, xAI recently announced automatic access to all Premium subscribers on X, its social media platform.
