When Open AI was launched ChatGPT, Google would have been caught off guard. This cycle repeated itself when Microsoft unveiled Bing with ChatGPTits search chatbot powered by GPT-4. And while Google responded to ChatGPT with Bardit still lacks an AI-powered search tool.
That could change very soon. In an explosive report, The New York Times (opens in a new tab) revealed that Google would be working on Magi, a new AI-powered search engine that would be its answer to Bing with ChatGPT.
Google Magi Rumored Features
* Magi is designed to be personalized and more conversational Google Search
*Google plans to initially roll out the features to 1 million people, then 30 million later
* Magi will adapt to your needs over time and recommend products to purchase
* Searches that may lead to a purchase may have ads on the search results page.
* A separate GIFI tool would help generate images in Google Image results
This project appears to be separate from Bard, although it wouldn’t be shocking to see Magi borrow from Google competitor ChatGPT. It’s also likely that some of the new features from the Magi AI project will make their way into the current version of Google Searchat least according to the New York Times report.
Google’s new search engine aims to be a “much more personalized experience” than the current version of Google Search. Magi would learn to adapt to a user’s needs over time, providing lists of pre-selected products to purchase, offering tracking search information and more.
Magic would be much more conversational than the current version of Google Search, but given that the current version of Search isn’t conversational at all, that’s not exactly a high bar to break. He might also know how to debug and write code, which is one of the most notable features – and something that Bard lacks.
Still, the emphasis on conversational tone shows that this new search engine is aimed squarely at Microsoft’s Bing Chat, which has begun to invade Bing search results as well as being its own distinct feature. While Google, by all appearances, had already been on high alert in its response to the new Bing, the report says that Samsung could abandon Google for Bing as the default search engine on Samsung phones. This development would have been a massive red flag for Google and pushed back the creation of this next-generation AI search engine.
Why Google is accelerating AI now
Certainly, Google had legitimate reasons to fall behind in the AI race. They would have waited a long time to fully commit to AI because these AI chatbots have a tendency to cheat – which, admittedly, we have seen a lot of evidence sustain. But Google may also have struggled to monetize an AI search engine, given that ads can hurt the user experience of a conversational AI chatbot. Neither ChatGPT nor Bing with ChatGPT currently offers ads, nor does Google Bard.
Magi would reverse this trend, albeit selectively. According to the New York Times report, searches that could lead to a purchase could have ads on the search results page. Google relies heavily on ad revenue, so keeping ads in its search engine is a must. This report says Google will achieve this by maintaining the user experience of a traditional search results page, but including a chatbot to interact with and provide more personalized results. The new Bing with ChatGPT notably adopts a completely different user interface and user experience from traditional Bing, which has a traditional search engine experience.
However, this is still largely speculation. While the New York Times reports that more than 160 people are currently working on Magi, Magi’s features are more likely to make their way into Google Search in the near future than Google unveils a groundbreaking new search engine. Either way, this new development definitely means we need to keep an eye out for Google I/O 2023as we got to see some of these features unveiled first.