The battle of free AI chatbots sees Bing leading, despite strong competition from OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Bard, and others.
Chatbots are increasingly becoming a key part of our digital interaction, assisting with a variety of tasks and streamlining our online experiences. Pioneered by OpenAI with its ChatGPT, there is now an array of free AI chatbots available for users. Recent launches by tech behemoths such as Google and Microsoft have intensified the competition, offering distinct capabilities and prompting a critical analysis of their performances.
The Journey of OpenAI’s ChatGPT
OpenAI first made headlines with the introduction of ChatGPT in November 2022. Built on the GPT-3.5 model, this chatbot was a game-changer in AI-assisted tasks like writing essays, fixing code, or managing personal finances. However, the newer ChatGPT-4, despite being faster and more accurate, comes with a monthly subscription cost, leaving the free version with some limitations, especially in internet searching.
The inability to scour the internet for current information can be a disadvantage for ChatGPT-3.5. It means that the chatbot’s knowledge is confined to the data it was trained on, up to September 2021. Although OpenAI is working on a plugin that allows it to use Bing’s search API for sourcing online information, this feature is only available to the paid Plus plan users.
Assessing the Performance of ChatGPT-3.5
While ChatGPT-3.5 is proficient at handling basic tasks, it occasionally stumbles on more complex questions. Testing with math problems and riddles revealed varying accuracy. Its performance was particularly inconsistent when tasked with more intricate math problems, such as solving a quadratic equation or multiplying large numbers.
This inconsistency also extends to its handling of complex queries, for instance, law-based questions from the Uniform Bar Exam. In terms of logical reasoning, the chatbot sometimes struggles to comprehend and answer accurately.
Microsoft’s Bing Takes on AI Chatbots
Microsoft’s Bing introduces its chatbot built on the superior GPT-4 model, differentiating itself in some ways from OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Unlike its counterpart, Bing’s chatbot can leverage its own search engine to answer queries about the latest happenings, providing a major advantage. However, the longer response time and compatibility only with the Microsoft Edge browser might hold some users back.
Despite leveraging the advanced GPT-4 model, Bing’s chatbot also fumbles on complex math problems and logical queries. However, it compensates by providing sources for its answers, facilitating user verification of the chatbot’s responses.
Google’s Bard Joins the AI Chatbot Race
Google’s contender in the AI chatbot battle is Bard, operating on its unique PaLM 2 language model. Distinguished by the ability to respond and prompt with images, supporting several programming languages, and accessing the internet, Bard adds another dimension to the AI chatbot competition.
When compared to GPT-4, Bard suggests that while GPT-4 excels in text generation, PaLM 2 leads in reasoning and logic. Despite offering more elaborate explanations to logical queries than Bing, Bard’s responses often lack sense. It performs well on riddles and math questions, with a couple of exceptions.
2/ Bard now also gets plugins
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Other Competitors in the AI Chatbot Market
Beyond the major players, other noteworthy competitors include You.com’s YouChat and Hugging Face’s HuggingChat. Both use OpenAI’s GPT-3.5 model but introduce unique elements. YouChat lists sources for most of the text it generates, provides links to related web pages, and can access current events. However, it struggles with complex math and logical problems.
HuggingChat, on the other hand, tends to generate long, rambling text in response to queries, often deviating from the initial topic and failing to provide precise answers to complex problems.
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Niche AI Chatbots and Conclusion
Alongside these general-purpose chatbots, a slew of niche chatbots caters to specific needs. Google’s Socratic is a mobile app dedicated to answering science, math, literature questions, and more, while DeepAI focuses on generating programming code, poems, stories, or essays.
To sum up, among the free AI chatbots, Bing offers the most comprehensive capabilities, despite some shortcomings. It not only incorporates the advanced GPT-4 model but also leverages its own search engine to answer current event-related queries. However, other chatbots like Bard and YouChat have their strengths and continue to improve, promising a future where AI chatbots might cater to a myriad of user needs.
Implications on Financial Markets
The implications of AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Bing, Bard, and others in the financial markets and crypto industry are profound. For financial markets, chatbots can serve as efficient customer service representatives, handling thousands of inquiries simultaneously, and providing accurate information on stock prices, market trends, and financial news.
They can also assist users in executing trades, managing portfolios, and even offering basic financial advice, thereby increasing efficiency and reducing the need for human intervention. In the crypto industry, chatbots could further enhance trading efficiency by providing real-time data on cryptocurrency prices, trading volumes, and market capitalization.
Furthermore, AI chatbots can offer critical alerts about sudden market changes or potential investment opportunities, help users track their crypto portfolio, and even facilitate quick transactions. As the technology behind these chatbots continues to evolve, their role in financial markets and the crypto industry is likely to become even more vital, ushering in a new era of automated trading and investment management.
