The digital technology arena, dominated by giants like Google and Microsoft, is a hotbed of competitive innovation, especially when it comes to artificial intelligence. This competition has produced notable events like the advent ofBing’s AI Chat on Android phonesand the incident where Binginaccurately generated an AI response for a Google Chrome search. Amidst this backdrop of rivalry and innovation, Microsoft has expanded the availability of their Bing AI chat experience, powered by ChatGPT and previously only available on the Edge browser, to now includeGoogle Chrome.
Earlier, the AI chatbot in Bing was only accessible via the Microsoft Edge browser. As reported by Windows Latest,Microsoft is extending this functionality to Google Chrome(via9to5Google). The integration is simple and intuitive, though it’s still in the process of rolling out. Once ready, users can go tobing.com, tap or click on the “Chat” icon in the top-left corner of the screen, and the chatbot activates, merging seamlessly with standard search results.
It’s significant to note that there are some restrictions on the Bing AI experience on Google Chrome. The 4,000-character limit in Edge has been decreased to 2,000 characters per question. Moreover, the chat conversation resets in Chrome after five messages as opposed to Edge’s more forgiving maximum of 30 messages. While not completely detrimental to the user experience, these limits may frustrate some people.
Microsoft has a history of nudging users away from Google Chrome and towards its own browser. Bing’s AI chat experience notably faced accusations of generating promotional text for Bing features instead of fulfilling user-requested searches for “Chrome.” This misleading practice attracted criticism and dented Bing’s reputation as Microsoft was positioning the chat feature as a competitor to AI experiences like ChatGPT andGoogle Bard. Following the backlash, Microsoft deactivated the feature, reiterating its commitment to experimenting with new features to enhance customer experiences.
Despite its limitations and previous controversies, this development merges Bing and Chrome functionalities, and that’s a win for the end user. It’s still in the process of rolling out — we’re not seeing the chatbot in Chrome on any of our accounts yet — but the Bing app for Android has the AI feature now if you want to try it out.
