IA en un minutoNewsBusiness and products
OpenAI says ChatGPT now equals one fifth of Google's search volume
IA en un minuto newsroom · Editor: Jon Elgezabal
In 30 seconds
OpenAI reckons ChatGPT already gets around 20% of the volume of search-like questions that Google handles. Adam Fry shared it at a dinner in New York and explained that they count as a search every question that makes ChatGPT go to the web. Ahrefs, with another method, estimated a lower share in February, and OpenAI has not clarified the period or regions.
OpenAI maintains that ChatGPT receives roughly one fifth of the search-like queries that reach Google. Adam Fry, head of ChatGPT consumer product, made the claim in a conversation with Alex Kantrowitz of Big Technology, at a dinner the company hosted in New York on Monday, November 2. The transcript came out the next day, according to Search Engine Journal.
For Fry, a search-like query is anything people would once have taken to a traditional search engine. Asked to be more precise, he explained that OpenAI counts a search each time a question leads ChatGPT to look something up on the web. He did not say which Google figure the comparison uses, what period it covers or which regions it includes.
In the same talk, Fry shared other numbers, according to Gizmodo: ChatGPT has 1.2 billion weekly active users, about 200 million more than two months ago. On paying subscribers, he repeated the latest public figure, 50 million, and said it has grown, without saying by how much.
Other estimates come out differently. In February, the analytics company Ahrefs put ChatGPT's volume at around 12% of Google's, with a different definition of search. The 20% is therefore an OpenAI figure built on its own criteria, not an independent measurement.
Why it matters · analysis and opinion
The figure works above all as a message: OpenAI wants to be seen as a real alternative to the dominant search engine, and it picks a definition that favors it to make the case. Without knowing which Google figure it compares against or over what period, the number does not show how much traffic is really shifting. What does seem clear is that more and more people ask an assistant what they used to look up on Google, and that changes how people reach a website or a product. For businesses that depend on showing up in search engines, the sensible step is to start checking how ChatGPT describes them and where it gets that information, without dropping classic search optimization just yet.
Source: Gizmodo · Written with the help of AI: how we make the news
