Have you tried AI yet? If you have, you’ve probably used ChatGPT, or maybe Snapchat’s “My AI” (if you don’t hate it, that is). Microsoft’s version of artificial intelligence, Bing Chat, is also powered by ChatGPT’s GPT-4, but until recently, the feature was locked behind a waitlist.
Now, however, the company has opened up Bing’s AI tools for everyone, making it one of the most accessible ways to get into AI right now.
A little background about AI
By now, you’re probably aware of ChatGPT. The AI chatbot took the internet by storm toward the end of 2022, smashing active user records left and right. Part of that appeal came from OpenAI’s decision to make the ChatGPT beta free to use, while the rest stemmed from the tool’s ability to do just about anything you asked of it.
Ask ChatGPT a simple question, and it’ll answer in a conversational tone. Ask it to write you a story, poem, or joke, and it’ll do that, too. You can even ask it to write you programming code, then rework that code when you give it a critique. It’s impressive, and terrifying—and the perfect search companion.
How Microsoft integrated ChatGPT’s AI into Bing
Of course, everyone and their mother now wants in on AI. As it happens, though, Microsoft is a huge investor in OpenAI, and has been working on integrating the AI into its search engine, Bing. Now, you’re able to ask Bing the same questions you do ChatGPT, but with access to the knowledge and data of the entire internet.
For example, say you want to plan a vacation for you and your partner’s anniversary. You could ask the new Bing: “We are planning a trip in September for our anniversary. We will be flying into London. Where are some great destinations within three hours of the city? What are some things we have to do while in London?”
We’re not used to asking search engines these types of complicated queries, but it’s how things are about to be going forward. When your results return, you’ll see the usual list of relevant articles appear, but, more importantly, you’ll see your AI friend typing out a response on the right. As the bot answers, you’ll see sources attached to those answers, so you can visit each site to learn more.
Screenshot: Jake Peterson
Even better, you can refine the search results with Bing’s chatbot feature: Just talk back to the bot to explain what you want to see different, and you’ll receive new results based on that feedback. You can also use this chat feature to keep the “conversation” going. If you’re trying to learn about something new, like a famous writer, Bing will give you an initial breakdown. You can then ask for more information, or ask more specific questions, such as which of their works are the most celebrated, or which are the most controversial. Like ChatGPT, the new Bing might just send you down a rabbit hole for whatever topic you’re interested in (and I can’t wait).
Bing Chat has brand new features out right now
The same day Microsoft made Bing Chat available to the public, it also updated the AI to support more features. The most immediately useful additions might be Edge actions. The idea here is to rely on Bing’s AI to complete tasks for you within the same window. So, you can ask Bing to play a movie you want to watch, and the AI will pull up the service the movie is hosted on and begin playing it.
The Next Wave of AI Innovation with Microsoft Bing and Edge
Now, your queries include more images and videos rather than just text, including charts and graphs to help you process the answer. Speaking of images, Bing’s Image Creator, which uses AI to produce images from your prompts, now supports over 100 languages. AI is also good at summarizing text, and you’ll see improvements to Bing’s summarization efforts going forward.
You can also keep the conversation going over time, since Bing supports both chat histories and persistent chats. That means you can return to your chats at any time, and take them with you via the Edge sidebar as you browse the web. You may notice more features and services in the future, too, as Microsoft has opened up Bing Chat to third-party developers. That will allow for features like booking reservations through OpenTable, or get answers to math and science questions from Wolfram|Alpha.
“Compose,” the feature that generates text for you, is also improving. After you ask Bing to write you a draft of, say, an email, you can give it feedback to improve things like tone, length, and phrasing.
New Bing Features | Compose
How to try out Microsoft’s AI Bing Chat now
Now that the waitlist to try Bing Chat is over, you can give Microsoft’s AI bot a spin right now. You’ll need to use Microsoft Edge to try it, then sign into your Microsoft account. If you don’t have one, you’ll need to make one. Once signed in, you should see the new Bing Chat icon appear in the top right of the browser. Click it, and have fun exploring all the things AI can do. (Just don’t forget to say thank you.)
This article was originally published on Feb. 14, 2023 and updated on May 4, 2023 with new information.
