ChatGPT is great for general purpose content, but sometimes you need a ChatGPT alternative for more complex queries, research, and content that follows strict guidelines. It might be the most well-known AI chatbot at the moment, but you have plenty of other choices to help with research, coding, translation, and more.
Tip: before you give up on ChatGPT, try these prompts to fuel your productivity.
1. Best for Google Users: Bard
Price: Free
Bard is Google’s ChatGPT alternative. It’s designed for general research queries, creating content, and even translating content. It’s not much different than ChatGPT, but in my tests, the research was a little better and more current. You’re given suggestions on how to start using the platform. Alternatively, you can just start a new chat at any time.
Highlights:
- Requires a Google account, and all queries/chats are saved to your account
- You can opt out of saving your Bard conversations
- Works almost identically to ChatGPT
2. Best for Microsoft Users: Copilot
Price: Free
Copilot by Microsoft recently merged with Bing Chat. It’s built into the Edge browser and lets you quickly ask questions. Create content, get summarized search results with reference links, and even create AI images. With Copilot, you also get free access to GPT-4 and DALL·E 3.
Highlights:
- Use as part of Edge browser or separately
- Offers Creative, Balanced, and Precise styles
- Can compose content, too, with the Compose feature
- Includes multiple AI platforms in one place
Curious about what you can do with AIs? We looked at Copilot vs. Tabnine to develop a game.
3. Best for Coding: Amazon CodeWhisperer
Price: Free with premium option
Amazon developed its own ChatGPT alternative just for coding: CodeWhisperer. You only need an AWS Builder ID to sign up. The free tier for individuals gives you unlimited coding suggestions, 50 security scans per month, and even has command line integration. Suggestions are based off surrounding code and comments.
Highlights:
- Generate a snippet or a full function
- Works with the command line
- Includes Amazon Q to generate code from an AI conversation
4. Best Variety of AI Tools: Poe
Price: Free with premium options
Poe, Platform for Open Exploration, is a Quora creation. Unlike most of the ChatGPT alternatives on this list, Poe isn’t just one tool. It’s a variety of AI tools, such as an assistant, search engine research, image creation, social media chats, and creative tasks. Some features are free, but access to GPT-4 and certain other features are for premium users only.
Highlights:
- Features numerous AI tools, from chatting to games
- Has apps for iOS, Android, Windows, and macOS
- Create your own AI chatbots
- Save chats for future reference
5. Best for Meetings: Otter
Price: Free with premium options
Otter isn’t going to write a blog post or an email for you. Instead, it records, transcribes, and summarizes notes from meetings. It makes meetings far more productive by automatically picking out the most important parts, highlighting what you need to know, and even creating a to-do list based on the meeting. The free version gives you 300 minutes (30 minutes at a time) per month.
Highlights:
- Integrates with Google Meet, Zoom, MS Teams, Slack, HubSpot, and Dropbox (syncs with Google and Microsoft calendars)
- Upload audio/video files from other tools (three free per month)
- Also captures slides to generate summaries
- Has iOS and Android apps
6. Best for Conversations: Character.AI
Price: Free
If you just want to have AI conversations, Character.AI is the perfect ChatGPT alternative. Every character has their own “personality” or niche. Chat about games, books, movies, your life, etc. There’s even an Elon Musk character to ask burning questions about X, formerly Twitter. You can play games, learn a language, or even write a poem. It’s all fun, so don’t take responses too seriously here.
Highlights:
- Features a growing library of AI chatbots to talk to
- Create your own AI chatbot
- Can learn from and propose questions to a community
7. Best for Content Creation: Chatsonic
Price: Free with premium options
Chatsonic, by Writesonic, labels itself as the “best ChatGPT alternative for content creation.” It uses GPT-4 to research, get content summaries, create marketing content, design images, and more. You can even upload files (PDFs, Word docs, videos, etc.) or links for your questions and pull out the most important details. The free version uses GPT-3.5 and allows 10,000 words of content per month.
Highlights:
- Start content creation with numerous AI templates
- Edit existing content for mistakes and flow
- Also available as a Chrome extension and mobile apps
8. Best for Research: You
Price: Free with premium options
You is an AI search engine that generously offers unlimited free AI searches. Instead of just a list of results, it gives you a summarized post with an intro and conclusion. All resources are listed just below the post, just like you’d find with AI summaries in Brave search. It also functions as a standard search engine. In addition, the platform writes content and generates AI images. If You isn’t working well, try Perplexity, which works similarly.
Highlights:
- Summarize any search query
- Choose use cases, tone, and even audience for content creation
- Free users get 10 writings, 10 AI images, and unlimited search chats
More Than Just ChatGPT
The above is just a sampling of the many ChatGPT alternatives available. Remember, when using any AI tool to write content, consider the ethics involved. If you prefer using AI tools on your desktop, check out these macOS ChatGPT desktop apps. Or, try these web apps that use ChatGPT.
Image credit: Unsplash. All images by Crystal Crowder.
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