News

Microsoft Brings AI Enhancements to Bing and Edge

• By Chris Paoli
• February 07, 2023

Microsoft Brings AI Enhancements to Bing and Edge

Microsoft has launched a new version of its Bing search engine, powered by OpenAI's ChatGPT-4 AI.

"It’s a new day for search," said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella during a press event announcing the newly revamped Bing. "AI will fundamentally change every software category, starting with the largest category of all -- search."

Along with the announcement came the refreshed Bing homepage, which will feature the revamped search, powered by the OpenAI technology. According to Microsoft, search results will now provide detailed answers to queries, not just Web site search results.

"Bing reviews results from across the web to find and summarize the answer you're looking for," said Microsoft in a blog post. "For example, you can get detailed instructions for how to substitute eggs for another ingredient in a cake you are baking right in that moment, without scrolling through multiple results."

Microsoft said that Bing's search capabilities have been enhanced in four key areas. First, search is now powered by a new version of OpenAI's large language model, which will provide more accurate and faster results, according to the company. Second, Microsoft has installed what it's calling a "Prometheus Model," which works in tangent with OpenAI's technology to provide safe and non-malicious results for users. Third, Microsoft has applied AI to its core search algorithm to improve the overall ranking of search results. Finally, the Bing homepage has gone through a makeover to provide a more "unified" experience for users.

For searches that are more complex than a simple question, Bing now comes with a major new feature in the form of an interactive AI chat that will help by asking follow-up questions about a query to narrow down the results. The goal is to help pinpoint the information a user is searching for, even if the user isn't sure exactly what to search for. It will also assist users in generating user-customized content, like emails, itineraries and recipe suggestions, as examples.

The new search capabilities are now available in a limited preview, with users only receiving a set number of searches during this launch window. Microsoft said it will make available a waitlist for the full version shortly.

Microsoft isn't only bringing ChatGPT and OpenAI to its search engine. The company announced that its Edge Web browser will also be receiving an AI makeover. A similar AI-powered chat has been added to the homepage, as well as a new compose feature, which will allow users to automatically generate content, like social media posts, by answering a few prompts.

While these new features will initially only be available in Edge, Microsoft said it is looking to offer these features in other browsers in the future.

Microsoft has been a key backer of OpenAI for several years now, starting with a $1 billion commitment in 2019 to a "multibillion" expansion announced just last month. OpenAI technology is already integrated into Microsoft Teams and the Azure cloud. Microsoft's announcement Tuesday is seen as an attempt to gain share in a search market that has been dominated by Google, and comes just one day after Google announced its own ChatGPT-like technology called Google Bard (which it will further demonstrate on Wednesday in an online event).