All users of ChatGPT can now access OpenAI’s AI-powered online search experience, ChatGPT Search, which has recently been updated with a number of new capabilities.
Either the user can manually select which questions to route through ChatGPT Search or utilize the new “Search the web” feature in the ChatGPT interface. By default, ChatGPT will do this. With ChatGPT Search, you can see compiled responses from many sources on the web alongside “rich” information like embedded images and videos from YouTube.
The latest version of OpenAI’s SearchGPT prototype, ChatGPT Search, came out in October. Using an optimized version of OpenAI’s GPT-4o model, ChatGPT Search retrieves data from the web and displays it with relevant sources, such as sports scores, news, financial quotations, and more. Users can then ask additional questions to further narrow their search.
ChatGPT Search Becomes Faster and Accessible to All Users
At first, only premium ChatGPT subscribers could use ChatGPT Search. Users who do not wish to pay can now also access it.
During a live stream on Monday, OpenAI announced that ChatGPT Search has been “faster” and is now available as the default search engine for all browsers. Furthermore, ChatGPT Search for mobile has been enhanced. For instance, the iOS ChatGPT app now displays better-organized company info, such as addresses and phone numbers, in Apple Maps.
Finally, the advanced voice mode, which is a conversational feature for ChatGPT developed by OpenAI, now includes ChatGPT Search. Soon, users on desktop or mobile devices will have access to the most recent web information when utilizing Advanced Voice Mode.
Some news outlets have voiced their disapproval of AI-powered search engines like Google’s AI Overviews, Perplexity, and ChatGPT Search, claiming that these tools pose a threat to their traffic. The de-emphasis on links to web pages caused by AI Overviews alone could negatively impact around 25% of publisher traffic, according to one study.
OpenAI claims to have included feedback from partners on how ChatGPT Search determines which articles are most relevant to a query, as well as the summary length and quotations for articles.
