Faced with ChatGPT, there are those who have the same feeling as when they tried the internet for the first time, but the reality is that despite its great potential, OpenAI’s conversational chat has flaws and limitations, one of which is the lack of sources or that it does not connect to Internet to search for answers. But ChatGPT is not alone: ​​there are AI tools capable of looking face to face at OpenAI chat like Perplexity AI. If you are not sure what Perplexity AI is, what it can be useful for and how to starta good start can be reading this article.

What is Perplexity AI?

Perplexity AI is a conversational search engine, that is, an answer engine that provides precise answers to more or less complex questions using extensive language models. Thus, its accuracy is limited by the capabilities of artificial intelligence and search results.

As its creators warn, as a result it can generate offensive or dangerous content. Also, recommend not to provide personal informationgiven that like other AI algorithms, it is train with the use. That is, with your questions, their answers, feedback and analysis by the development team.

What difference then ChatGPT with Perplexity AI? If you’re just starting to try out these AI tools, you may have made a hodgepodge of what’s good for what and what to expect. We start with something as important as the internet connection: while ChatGPT is “limited” to its training and data (note, more than 175 million parameters, which are not few), Perplexity AI relies on the immensity of the internet to offer you answers , which allows you keep up to date with what is happening and search if needed to offer answers in real time.

The second big difference has to do with the sources and it is essential: What good is it that ChatGPT offers you an answer that seems true to reality if you can’t verify it unless you have a lot of experience in the subject? This is one of the reasons why it is so dangerous to use it for class work or even for programming, which is why its use is prohibited to solve Stack Overflow doubts. After you provide your answer, Perplexity AI lists where it got the information from, so you can check it yourself.

In any case, both ChatGPT and Perplexity AI stand out for their ability to contextualizewhich allows to maintain a conversation in the case of OpenAI chat or to chain a interrogation with Perplexity AI. For example, if you ask him about the latest Apple phone and then ask him “and the laptop?”, he is able to understand that we mean the Apple computer.

If we compare it with Google, the difference is abysmal: while the Mountain View engine is essentially limited to returning results in SEO order (although it increasingly places more importance on their suggestions and less on pure linking), Perplexity AI understands your question, looks for the answer and is able to write it, not as a copy-and-paste, but taking the sources that he considers most relevant and constructing a discourse with meaning and precision. For us to understand each other, it’s like doing a job old fashioned: document yourself, to understand and elaborate the answer using different concepts. At the end of the answer, your sources as a bibliography.

Regarding functionality, roughly Perplexity AI would be a kind of hypothetical child between ChatGPT and Google.

How to use Perplexity AI?

After explaining its capabilities and operation, it is normal that you want to try it. Well, you can do it: although still in beta phase, It’s open to everyone and it’s free.. In addition, it is a good time to do it: it does not have traffic problems and its operation is fluid.

An interesting point is that you don’t even need to registerSimply access their website https://www.perplexity.ai/ from any browser (it can be on a computer, tablet, mobile) and enter your question. The interface is very similar to that of the Google search engine.

As you may have seen in the Perplexity AI screenshots that we have posted to illustrate the article, the menus and texts on the website are in English, but you can ask questions in Spanish and he will also answer you in Spanish.

A couple of interesting tidbits: When switching languages, you tend to opt for local fonts. We have also tested it in French and Basque and in both cases it is able to understand the question and answer it, but while in Spanish and French it returned the question in those same languages, in Basque it chose to answer either in English or in the language that we had formulated the previous question.

Ideas for using Perplexity AI

Now that we are clear about what it is and how to use Perplexity AI, we may need ideas to put it into practice. Taking advantage of its status as an updated search engine, let’s go with a rabidly topical question: who is behind Netflix? Note: let’s remember that Reed Hastings has ceased to be CEO of Netflix a few hours ago.

As you can see, Perplexity AI is already aware of the current situation. So you can be useful to offer a summary of the newsavoiding several clicks, readings and headlines clickbait. The sources offer little objection: Netflix itself, Wikipedia and two reputable outlets such as CNBC and the Hollywood Reporter. In case of doubt of its veracity? You can always compare by pulling sources.

Thus, it is assumed that it will be fully up to date with competitions and statisticsFor example, which player has scored the most headed goals so far in the first league. But this was an easy statistic.

If we ask him about the Chilean ones, he has no answer, since he is not able to find a source that offers him the data. However, regarding which player has scored more with his left leg, yes.

only one source, Marca and its player statistics database, which means that it has not been able to cross this data with other information to compare it. And if Brand is not updated? So the answer will be wrong.

Keep up to date with what is happening can be useful for issues that change frequently, such as knowing what will be the price of electricity in Spain tomorrowthus, without having to specify the day.

As data, the price of electricity for tomorrow is provided by the Red Eléctrica de España (REE) the day before, so in practice yet (it is 8 am) it is not possible to know the concrete answer. In the concise answer Perplexity does not get wet, but in the detailed one it does give us some indications to know it and the sources to verify it. The reliability of the answers is not entirely accurate.

Or something that doesn’t change that frequently, for example novelties implemented in legislation or regulations. Another example: suppose the battery of my iPhone 13 Pro has deteriorated and I want to replace it in the Apple SAT, which has official prices. The problem? That these change from February 28. Will Perplexity know?

Not only does he know this variation, but he also gives you advice so you can save some money by changing it to a different SAT that is listed as a source. It’s not the only one, but what good publicity.

This can be useful for long-standing processes with numerous changes, for example the emergency lights for V-16 vehicles. It must be taken into account that although initially there was talk of some requirements, at the beginning of last year there was a reform in the Roadside Assistance Regulations adding the need for it to be connected and with geopositioning.

Be careful here because while in the extended version it does explain it, in the concise version it can lead us to error. It is not infallible.

As you can see, although the understanding of the question and the context is correct and the connection allows you to be quite up to date with the news, the reliability of the answers is subject to the number of sources with that data, their credibility and the comparison of data.