OpenAI unveils AI search engine SearchGPT - not that you're allowed to use it yet

After months of speculation, shy and retiring OpenAI has showed the world a glimpse of its very own web search engine powered by AI.

Dubbed SearchGPT, it's right now at the prototype stage, and is slated to come out in earnest at some point in the future, OpenAI announced today. If you want to try it out, you'll need to join a waitlist before you can sign up, though only "a small group of users and publishers" will be able to get access.

"Getting answers on the web can take a lot of effort, often requiring multiple attempts to get relevant results," the restrained and never knowingly hyping OpenAI says. "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."

Users able to get into the thing will, we're told, receive quick and direct answers to their questions with the latest info from the web, and will have the ability to ask followup questions for more details. It's web search but with a conversational natural-language user interface powered by GPT-3.5, GPT-4, and GPT-4o. The super lab says SearchGPT can, for instance, be used to ask about the weather and upcoming events, with news articles attached for further info.

While that all sounds cool, it's not exactly clear what SearchGPT is doing different than regular ChatGPT. OpenAI's flagship AI chatbot can already scour the web for mostly up-to-date info; it can even tell you the weather forecast for the day. Indeed, OpenAI says it plans on integrating "the best of these features directly into ChatGPT."

It doesn't seem all too unique compared to Microsoft Copilot and Google AI Overviews, either, which already boast the features OpenAI has been talking up. The mock-up OpenAI provided looks pretty similar to Copilot, in fact. It's clear SearchGPT is pitched against not only Google and Microsoft but also other search-focused AI services, such as Perplexity.

The announcement today also pulls back the curtain a little to reveal the interesting relationship OpenAI has with Microsoft. The IT giant has pledged billions of dollars in support to the super lab, and in return incorporated OpenAI's technology in all corners of its software empire, from Copilot and Azure to Windows.

And now, here comes OpenAI with SearchGPT to challenge Microsoft's Copilot search functionality and Bing - at a time when Bing has been barred from indexing new Reddit posts in a dispute over the harvesting of AI training data, and is now offering generative features.

In fact, it further shows OpenAI's disdain for its own backer Microsoft that it waited until the Bing news this week to one-up Redmond with SearchGPT. OpenAI loves to do this: Wait for a competitor to announce something, and then soon after try to steal the limelight.

That said, there is one thing that sets SearchGPT apart from its rivals, and that's the partnership OpenAI has with publishing titan News Corp.

"We've partnered with publishers to build this experience and continue to seek their feedback," OpenAI says. "In addition to launching the SearchGPT prototype, we are also launching a way for publishers to manage how they appear in SearchGPT, so publishers have more choices. Importantly, SearchGPT is about search and is separate from training OpenAI's generative AI foundation models."

Reddit also has a relationship with OpenAI (and Google) allowing the super lab to access the mega-forum's posts and data for training and offering machine-learning products, such as ChatGPT and SearchGPT.

While it's not clear if unfettered access to News Corp's publications will make OpenAI's search engine particularly potent, it does seem to come at a decisive moment. The AI lab has been sued by the New York Times and other American papers for using their articles to train AI models, and more websites are cutting off generative AI firms, especially OpenAI, from easy access for both training and merely looking up content.

If you do get your hands on SearchGPT, check out the privacy policy. For one thing, it by default "collects and shares" your general location in order to look up stuff near you that's relevant to your query. ®