This week, OpenAI debuted its long-rumored AI browser that goals to place its AI chatbot on the middle of the web. The browser, referred to as ChatGPT Atlas, is getting into an area that’s already occupied by Perplexity’s Comet and Google Gemini in Chrome. OpenAI is probably going betting that placing ChatGPT entrance and middle is sufficient to attract customers in, however the general expertise falls brief when in comparison with rivals to date.
The Chromium-based ChatGPT Atlas — at the moment unique to macOS, although variations for different platforms are promised — comes with a minimalist interface. On the left aspect of the window, you’ll discover a collapsible tab along with your ChatGPT historical past. Within the middle is your URL bar, which additionally helps you to instantly search utilizing ChatGPT. On the correct is an “Ask ChatGPT” button, which you’ll be able to hit to talk particularly about no matter web site you’re at the moment on. For ChatGPT Plus, Enterprise, and Professional members, there’s additionally an “agentic mode,” which may full duties like including objects to a web-based purchasing cart.
ChatGPT Atlas’ homescreen affords options for getting began, like “Discover the most effective eating places close to me.” Over time, it populates with some suggestions primarily based on what you’ve looked for within the browser, although it wasn’t at all times clear how — the browser confirmed me a recommended seek for Halloween costume suggestions after I requested ChatGPT for concepts just a few occasions, however by no means surfaced something associated to eating places regardless of me conducting a number of searches for them. Both manner, I discovered myself lacking the choice to view the every day information tales and climate I can discover on the Microsoft Edge homepage, or the Perplexity Comet browser’s customizable “Uncover” web page with latest information, even when all its snippets are AI-generated (which raises a bunch of questions).
When you do get began with ChatGPT Atlas, the instantly apparent downside is that ChatGPT merely doesn’t really feel like an enough portal to the online. Whenever you first kind a question, you’ll usually obtain an AI-generated response from ChatGPT, after which you’ll be able to elect to do issues like flip your question right into a basic net search with an inventory of associated blue hyperlinks, just like basic Google Search. However the outcomes aren’t at all times related. After I looked for “information close to me,” for instance, ChatGPT supplied an AI-generated response with tales related to my space. However the search outcomes web page gave me hyperlinks to native information web sites for the San Francisco Bay Space; Little Rock, Arkansas; Salt Lake Metropolis, Utah; and different places the place I don’t dwell.
Like Google, ChatGPT Atlas will show a map in case you’re searching for a enterprise or attraction in a particular space, together with a short description of every spot and its hours, worth vary, and scores. However you may’t click on into the critiques and even see the place they arrive from. This places OpenAI at a drawback in comparison with, say, Comet, which contains a TripAdvisor integration, permitting you to view extra detailed details about a location, photos, and AI-summarized critiques.
Searches for different subjects, like “how one can apply fertilizer to an orchid” or “greatest eating places in Las Vegas,” yielded extra related outcomes from throughout the online. However ChatGPT Atlas will present you simply 10 hyperlinks per question, with no possibility to incorporate outcomes past that. Whenever you enter a brand new query in the identical chat, ChatGPT Atlas will stack the outcomes, permitting you to scroll up and down the web page to see all of the hyperlinks related to your chat. The cut up between subjects isn’t simple to see, as ChatGPT Atlas divides it with a barely seen grey line and textual content that states what you’ve looked for.
OpenAI will even save your searches to the identical place the place your ChatGPT conversations go, which may shortly muddle issues up if you wish to revisit sure chats from the chatbot’s standalone app. The restricted search expertise might be why ChatGPT Atlas features a hyperlink to Google within the top-right nook of every search outcomes web page.
Along with the brand new net search tab, ChatGPT Atlas shows choices to seek for photos, movies, and information tales. There’s additionally a “browser recollections” function inside ChatGPT Atlas, which tailors chat responses and options to your latest queries. ChatGPT Atlas can reorder and shut tabs for you as properly, with the flexibility to group tabs on the way in which.
After all, the massive promise of AI browsers isn’t simply that they’ll allow you to discover issues on-line, however that they may also help contextualize and navigate no matter you’re . Whenever you land on a webpage with ChatGPT Atlas, you may spotlight and right-click textual content to ask ChatGPT for extra details about a particular snippet. It’s also possible to open up the Ask ChatGPT tab on the upper-right aspect of the browser to ask questions on what you’re studying, or to floor associated info with out having to open one other tab. It’s mainly a ChatGPT-flavored model of Gemini in Chrome and Perplexity’s AI assistant in Comet, and after a little bit of early testing, appears to work about as properly.
The agentic mode for paid customers goes a step additional and may carry out duties in your behalf, comparable to making appointments or reserving journeys, or serving to you full a purchase order. It would do that, nevertheless, a bit slowly. I discovered that you need to manually choose the “agentic mode” button earlier than making your request; in any other case, ChatGPT Atlas will say it could actually’t full the duty.
For my first request, I requested ChatGPT Atlas to replenish my Amazon cart with objects primarily based on my latest searching historical past, and it took the chatbot a complete of 10 minutes so as to add simply three objects. I watched as ChatGPT Atlas navigated Amazon’s interface and talked itself via varied points. “It seems I opened a brand new tab, however it’s nonetheless displaying ‘about:clean,’ which suggests the web page hasn’t totally loaded. I’ll give it time,” ChatGPT wrote to itself at one level. In the meantime, it took Comet about two minutes so as to add three objects to my cart — nonetheless not blazing quick, however extra cheap.
However ChatGPT Atlas efficiently composed and despatched an e-mail instantly in Gmail in round 30 seconds, and created a Google Calendar occasion for me in the identical period of time. It additionally looked for the most effective eating places close to me and obtained able to e book a reservation at one in a couple of minutes, however it obtained tripped up once I requested it to schedule the reservation for “subsequent Friday.” ChatGPT Atlas scheduled it for this Friday as an alternative.
Given the choices already on the market, ChatGPT Atlas is a little bit of an underwhelming begin for an organization that wishes to construct a sequence of interconnected apps that would finally turn into an AI working system. The corporate has already launched apps inside ChatGPT that work instantly with providers like Zillow, Spotify, and Canva, together with a method to buy merchandise from Walmart and Etsy whereas utilizing the chatbot, none of which requires a devoted browser. AI could also be the way forward for search, however ChatGPT Atlas nonetheless wants loads of work if OpenAI desires to drag folks away from conventional browsers like Chrome.
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