Skip to main content

Perplexity’s two new features take it beyond just a chatbot

Perplexity AI, makers of the popular chatbot by the same name, announced Thursday that it is rolling out a pair of new features that promise to give users more flexibility over the sorts of sources they employ: Internal Knowledge Search and Spaces.

“Today, we’re launching Perplexity for Internal Search: one tool to search over both the web and your team’s files with multi-step reasoning and code execution,” Perplexity AI CEO Aravind Srinivas wrote on X (formerly Twitter). Previously, users were able to upload personal files for the AI to chew through and respond upon, the same way they could with Gemini, ChatGPT, or Copilot. With Internal Search, Perplexity will now dig through both those personal documents and the internet to infer its response.

Recommended Videos

Today, we're launching Perplexity for Internal Search: one tool to search over both the web and your team's files with multi-step reasoning and code execution. pic.twitter.com/ftZGNgziBW

— Aravind Srinivas (@AravSrinivas) October 17, 2024

“Being able to carry out all your research — across both internal and external sources of data — in one consolidated knowledge platform will unlock tremendous productivity gains for every enterprise,” the company wrote in an announcement blog post. The company notes that early adopters such as financial services firms have used Internal Search to “conduct more robust due diligence by tapping into internal research, call notes, and the latest industry news.”

Spaces, on the other hand, is an “AI-powered research and collaboration hub,” per the company, that enables you to customize and fine-tune Perplexity’s AI assistant to specific project data and requirements. You’ll be able to both choose their preferred LLM model and specify how said model should react to their inputs and instructions.

The company automatically opts its Enterprise Pro customers out from using their private data to further train its AI, though regular Pro users have to manually quit through the settings menu. “We understand the sensitivity of the data our customers work with, and we’re committed to ensuring Perplexity offers the highest levels of safety and privacy, empowering teams to conduct their most critical research without compromise,” the company wrote, noting that it plans to also soon incorporate Crunchbase and FactSet for its Enterprise Pro customers.

The new features are arriving first for Perplexity Pro and Enterprise Pro subscribers. A Pro plan runs $20 per month, which is in line with the prices OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic all charge for their individual tier subscriptions. Enterprise Pro goes for $40 per month, per user.

While Perplexity is a hit among its users, the company is very much not so among the numerous websites that it scrapes its training data from.

In 2024 alone, Perplexity has been accused of “directly ripping off” new articles from CNBC and Forbes (the latter of which is now threatening legal action); it’s been sent a cease and desist order by both The New York Times and Conde Nast; and accused of outright plagiarism by Wired. In the Forbes case, Perplexity’s chatbot reportedly output a near-verbatim version of an exclusive, paywalled report about ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt’s military drone ambitions that was viewed nearly 30,000 times.

Andrew Tarantola
Andrew Tarantola is a journalist with more than a decade reporting on emerging technologies ranging from robotics and machine…
What is Gemini Advanced? Here’s how to use Google’s premium AI
Google Gemini on smartphone.

Google's Gemini is already revolutionizing the way we interact with AI, but there is so much more it can do with a $20/month subscription. In this comprehensive guide, we'll walk you through everything you need to know about Gemini Advanced, from what sets it apart from other AI subscriptions to the simple steps for signing up and getting started.

You'll learn how to craft effective prompts that yield impressive results and stunning images with Gemini's built-in generative capabilities. Whether you're a seasoned AI enthusiast or a curious beginner, this post will equip you with the knowledge and techniques to harness the power of Gemini Advanced and take your AI-generated content to the next level.
What is Google Gemini Advanced?

Read more
You can now generate AI videos right in Premiere Pro
An example of the Firefly video generator

Firefly can now generate videos from image and text prompts, as well as extend existing clips, Adobe announced on Monday. The new feature is currently rolling out to Premiere Pro subscribers.

The video generation feature makes its debut in a number of new tools for Premiere Pro and the Firefly web app. PP's Generative Extend, for example, can tack on up to two seconds of added AI footage to either the beginning or ending of a clip, as well as make mid-shot adjustments to the camera position, tracking, and even the shot subjects themselves.

Read more
Google AI helped researchers win two Nobel Prizes this week
nobel peace prize

It's been another insane week in the world of AI. While Tesla CEO Elon Musk was debuting his long-awaited Cybercab this week (along with a windowless Robovan that nobody asked for), Google's AI was helping researchers win Nobel Prizes, Zoom revealed its latest digital assistant, and Meta sent its Facebook and Instagram chatbots to the U.K.

Check out these stories and more from this week's top AI headlines.
Google's AI helped researchers win two Nobel Prizes

Read more