Welcome to this Perplexity AI tutorial for beginners, where you will learn the basic of this tool.

What is Perplexity?

Perplexity is a conversational AI search engine that allows users to ask questions and receive direct answers, rather than just a list of web links. It leverages large language models like GPT-4 and Claude to understand queries, search the internet, and synthesize relevant information into concise responses. Also, one of its primary features is that it cites the sources used to construct each answer, increasing transparency and credibility.

But why would you use Perplexity AI in the first place?

Perplexity AI excels at providing precise, up-to-date information and answers by searching the internet in real-time.

It is particularly useful for research, fact-checking, and getting accurate information on current events or rapidly changing topics.

It also cites its sources, allowing you to verify the information.

How much does it cost?

Perplexity offers both a free plan and a paid subscription called Perplexity Pro.

Free Plan:

• Unlimited basic searches
• 5 Pro Searches per day
• Access to Perplexity's own language model

Perplexity Pro subscription:

• $20 per month
• $200 per year (saves $40 compared to monthly)
• Up to 600 Pro Searches per day
• Access to advanced AI models like GPT-4, Claude, and Sonar

Getting started

First, go to the Perplexity AI website.

This is where you should arrive. No need to create an account here, though it's recommended if you think you'll start using the tool more and more.

If you're using ChatGPT or even Google, this shouldn't be out of place: you enter the prompts in the box in the center and the AI will reply.

Let's ask a topical question.

As you can see, one of the distinctive features of Perplexity AI is that it starts by giving its sources, then gives a sort of up-to-date, factual summary of the event in question. It also provides illustrations taken from the web.

Library, threads and collections

A thread refers to a complete back-and-forth conversation with the AI assistant. It includes your initial query, any follow-up questions you ask, and the corresponding responses from Perplexity.

Collections allow users to organize their threads into categorized groups.

The Library is a dedicated section in Perplexity where users can access and manage their threads and Collections. It acts as a centralized hub for organizing and revisiting your search history, conversations, and collaborative workspaces.

In summary, threads are individual conversations with Perplexity, Collections allow you to organize and collaborate on threads, and the Library is the central location to access and manage your threads and Collections within the Perplexity platform

Page

A Perplexity Page is a new feature (at the time of writing this article reserved for Pro users) that allows users to create custom web pages based on their search queries and the information gathered by Perplexity's AI.

To create a Page, go to the Library and click the "+" button.

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Discover

The Discover tab is a feature that curates and presents the most popular and trending news stories, articles, and topics from across the internet, in the form of Pages.

Here are the key points to know about the Discover tab:

- The Discover tab aggregates content from various sources and uses AI to analyze and summarize the most relevant and engaging stories, topics, and information.

- The content on the Discover tab is refreshed in real-time, ensuring you have access to the latest news, trends, and developments as they unfold.

- While the Discover tab provides a general overview of popular content, it can also be personalized based on your browsing history, search queries, and interests within Perplexity.

The Focus Button

When looking to ask something to Perplexity, you notice that there's a few buttons at the bottom of the "box", and the first one is the "Focus" button.

When you click on it, you get a few options: All, Academic, Writing, Wolfram...

The focus feature basically allows you to choose how Perplexity will behave, both in terms of how it will gather the information (is it going to focus only on academic papers or videos?) and in terms of output (should it focus on calculations? give you Reddit discussions?).

This is actually one of the most important Perplexity AI feature.

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The Attach Button

The attach button is essentially there so that you can give to the AI any kind of document you have.

It's a really interesting feature as it allows you to summarize PDFs in a few seconds.

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Changing the AI model

Another cool feature with Perplexity AI is that if you get the Pro version, you can actually decide which AI model you want to use between (for now Claude 3, GPT-4 and LLaMa 3, which are all great models).

Why you should use Perplexity AI

This is a rather complicated answer, as AI solutions tend to look very similar, but in my opinion Perplexity AI has a number of features that make it unique:

First of all, Perplexity AI is totally connected to the Internet and has its own algorithm for searching the web, unlike, for example, ChatGPT, which has to use Bing.

What's more, the display of answers taken from the web is very interesting: first, the sources (and not just one, as is often the case with its competitors) are given, then an answer is given that refers to the source used for each argument.

Further questions are also proposed, and the tool offers to show images or videos associated with our question.

Finally, and this is a personal opinion, my favorite aspect of Perplexity AI is that it looks like an improved version of Google for everything to do with searching for “current” data. For example, if I ask a question about Apple's latest conference, current data will be used, which on the one hand ensures that I have up-to-date information (unlike ChatGPT, where the data is sometimes “out of date”) and on the other hand reduces the risk of hallucination when the AI doesn't have the information and therefore starts to invent it.

I therefore recommend Perplexity AI primarily as a research tool.