Microsoft announces improved AI-powered search and browser

Microsoft is introducing a new AI-powered Bing search engine and Edge browser, available in preview now at Bing.com, to deliver better search, more complete answers, a new chat experience, and the ability to generate content. The company hopes these tools can serve as an AI copilot for the web.

The announcement comes on the heels of Google’s new AI and the explosion of ChatGPT.

“AI will fundamentally change every software category, starting with the largest category of all—search,” said Satya Nadella, chairman and CEO, Microsoft. “Today, we’re launching Bing and Edge powered by AI copilot and chat, to help people get more from search and the web.”

Microsoft is bringing together search, browsing, and chat into one unified experience you can invoke from anywhere on the web, to deliver:

• Better search. The new Bing gives users an improved version of the familiar search experience, providing more relevant results for simple things like sports scores, stock prices and weather, along with a new sidebar that shows more comprehensive answers if needed.
• Complete answers. Bing reviews results from across the web to find and summarize the answer you’re looking for. 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.
• A new chat experience. For more complex searches—such as for planning a detailed trip itinerary or researching what TV to buy—the new Bing offers new, interactive chat. The chat experience empowers you to refine your search until you get the complete answer you are looking for by asking for more details, clarity and ideas—with links available so you can immediately act on your decisions.
• A creative spark. There are times when you need more than an answer—you need inspiration. The new Bing can generate the content to help you. It can help you write an email, create a 5-day itinerary for a dream vacation to Hawaii, with links to book your travel and accommodations, prep for a job interview or create a quiz for trivia night. The new Bing also cites all its sources, so you’re able to see links to the web content it references.
• New Microsoft Edge experience. The Edge browser has been updated with new AI capabilities and a new look, and along with the addition of two new functionalities: Chat and compose. With the Edge Sidebar, you can ask for a summary of a lengthy financial report to get the key takeaways—and then use the chat function to ask for a comparison to a competing company’s financials and automatically put it in a table. You can also ask Edge to help you compose content, such as a LinkedIn post, by giving it a few prompts to get you started. After that, you can ask it to help you update the tone, format, and length of the post. Edge can understand the web page you’re on and adapts accordingly.

The new Bing experience is a culmination of four technical breakthroughs:

• Next-generation OpenAI model. The new Bing is running on a new, next-generation OpenAI large language model that is more powerful than ChatGPT and customized specifically for search. It takes key learnings and advancements from ChatGPT and GPT-3.5—and it is even faster, more accurate, and more capable.
• Microsoft Prometheus model. This combination gives users more relevant, timely, and targeted results, with improved safety.
• Applying AI to core search algorithm. The AI model is applied to the core Bing search ranking engine, which led to the largest jump in relevance in two decades. With this AI model, even basic search queries are more accurate and more relevant.
• New user experience. Microsoft reimainges how users interact with search, browser, and chat by pulling them into a unified experience. This will unlock a completely new way to interact with the web.

According to the company, these new search experiences are possible because Microsoft has committed to building Azure into an AI supercomputer for the world, and OpenAI has used this infrastructure to train the breakthrough models that are now being optimized for Bing.

Together with OpenAI, Microsoft has been intentional in implementing safeguards to defend against harmful content. Teams are working to address issues such as misinformation and disinformation, content blocking, data safety and preventing the promotion of harmful or discriminatory content in line with AI principles.

Microsoft plans to scale the preview to millions in the coming weeks. A mobile experience will also be in preview soon.

For more information about this news, visit www.microsoft.com.