OpenAI debuts AI-powered SearchGPT search engine

OpenAI today previewed SearchGPT, a brand new search engine powered by its artificial intelligence technology.

The corporate described the service as a “temporary prototype” in a blog post. Based on OpenAI, the plan is to gather feedback about SearchGPT from a bunch of initial adopters after which integrate the perfect features into ChatGPT. That implies the search engine won’t remain available as a standalone offering in the long run.

SearchGPT is built around a normal search box that takes natural language queries as input. When it receives a prompt, the service doesn’t return a listing of relevant webpages but slightly AI-generated text intended to directly answer the user’s query. Based on OpenAI, SearchGPT cites the webpage on which a prompt response relies with a link placed in parentheses at the tip of the text.

The responses that the service generates vary based on the query. A straightforward query might prompt SearchGPT to display a single-sentence answer. In other cases, it might output multiple paragraphs or a listing. Some SearchGPT responses include not only text but in addition images and a related content sidebar with links to relevant webpages.

SearchGPT supports followup questions. Based on OpenAI, the service doesn’t simply answer the extra queries entered by the user but in addition takes under consideration the sooner requests that preceded them. That context may help the underlying AI models generate more relevant output. 

For publishers, OpenAI is rolling out features that may make it possible to administer how copyrighted content is utilized by SearchGPT. The corporate didn’t specify how the features will work. It did disclose that publishers may opt to not have their articles used for AI training, but still include that content in SearchGPT search results.

“We expect there may be room to make search significantly better than it’s today,” OpenAI Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman wrote on X. “We’ll learn from the prototype, make it higher, after which integrate the tech into ChatGPT to make it real-time and maximally helpful.”

The corporate didn’t specify if the planned search feature would require a paid ChatGPT subscription or is about to develop into available free of charge. If SearchGPT were to be incorporated into ChatGPT’s free version, it could create more competition for Microsoft Corp.’s Bing, which can be powered by language models from OpenAI. Microsoft has provided OpenAI with greater than $10 billion price of cloud infrastructure and funding to support its work.

SearchGPT could potentially also create more competition for Google LLC. Earlier this yr, the Alphabet Inc. unit equipped its search engine with a feature called AI Overviews that may directly answer user questions similarly to OpenAI’s latest service.

It’s unclear how the ChatGPT developer plans to generate profits from its search technology. After integrating SearchGPT into ChatGPT, OpenAI might try to embed ads into the prompt answers the tool generates. Alternatively, OpenAI could develop a paid enterprise version to assist staff navigate business data repositories.

Image: OpenAI