OpenAI launches web search in ChatGPT

OpenAI is launching internet search functionality within its ChatGPT AI chatbot. For paid subscribers, the chatbot will now be able to integrate up-to-date web information into its answers.

The search function assembles a custom package of information in response to a search. For instance, the search “what’s the latest stock price and news for Company X” yields a quick summary, then a neat stock price chart, followed by a list of recent news items about Company X—each with a clickable source button at the end of the text. A “sources” button at the bottom of the results launches a sidebar containing a full list of the sources used.

OpenAI says its rolling out the search functionality on mobile and desktop to its ChatGPT Plus and ChatGPT Team subscribers today, and to ChatGPT Enterprise and Education users within the next few weeks. The company plans to add search to the free version of ChatGPT “over the coming months.” It also plans to add search to Advanced Voice Mode in the mobile app, meaning users will be able to chat outloud with an assistant with access to the web.

For many user queries ChatGPT automatically integrates web content into its results. Users can also manually tell the chatbot to search the web for an answer by clicking a small web search icon within the input window. The user can then ask follow-up questions, and the chatbot will remember the full context of the chat, so that there’s no need to repeat information.

OpenAI uses web crawlers to find and index content from the web. It’s also licensed content from a number of publishers. OpenAI Search product lead Adam Fry says the search functionality is powered by the company’s most advanced models, including GPT-4o and the recently released o1 model that’s designed to reason through complex problems. “You have o1, which is our latest and greatest new intelligence, and we’ve distilled that into a fine-tuned version of 4o, which is really fine-tuned to give you amazing answers that incorporate information taken from the web,” Fry says.

The company says it is working with Microsoft and other (unnamed) third parties to both crawl the web for useful content, and grab real-time data such as stocks and sports scores from the web. Then the large language model that underpins ChatGPT weaves that content into conversational answers that are tailored to the intent of the user’s query. OpenAI also licenses web content from publishers including Associated Press, Financial Times, Le Monde, News Corp., Reuters, The Atlantic, Time, and others.

Publishers without such arrangements can prevent OpenAI’s OAI-Searchbot from grabbing pieces of their content. “If you’d like to appear in ChatGPT Search you can leave [Searchbot] as is and you’ll be able to be picked up by publicly available crawling, but if you’d like to be left out and not have your content displayed you can also opt out of Searchbot. We’ve been very vocal and transparent about that.”

The addition of search might boost ChatGPT Pro subscriber numbers, at least until the functionality comes to the free product. While OpenAI isn’t yet profitable, its CFO Sarah Friar recently said it currently makes 75% of its revenue from consumer subscriptions. The “Pro” version of ChatGPT, for example, costs $20 per month.

ChatGPT with search could have a corrosive effect on Google’s search ads business, which made the giant’s fortunes starting in the 2000s when “Googling” became the de facto entry point to web content. But if users prefer to launch searches from a chatbot and get complete answers instead of a list of links, Google could begin to see fewer searches on its platform and fewer opportunities to show search ads. However, Google has its own AI search tool, AI Overviews.

OpenAI’s search feature could also threaten the AI search startup Perplexity, which was first to market with a pure-play AI search tool. Perplexity also earns money through subscriptions to its Pro service, which offers advanced search options and access to a number of third-party large language models. It might even further strain OpenAI’s relationship with its main backer, Microsoft, which operates its own AI search function in Bing.

And more entrants in the AI search race are coming. The Information reported this week that Meta is also developing its own AI search capability for its AI chatbot.