• Business Insider tracked the results of AI chatbots and search engines on Election Day.
• Perplexity AI had detailed election insights. While ChatGPT shifted to news sites like AP.
• Google Gemini and Copilot avoided election topics, citing possible inaccuracies and limitations.

The 2024 presidential election has been called, and this year voters had the opportunity to get involved using AI-powered search tools.

Perplexity AI has created a dedicated “Election Information Hub” to inform voters about election logistics, ballot measures, candidate stances, and tracking results.

The OpenAI blog on global elections says that starting November 5, people who ask ChatGPT about election results will see a message encouraging them to check news sources such as the Associated Press and Reuters, or their state or local election authority to receive the most comprehensive and up-to-date information. current information.

Business Insider investigates Results of popular AI chatbots and search engines throughout Election Day and Wednesday morning to see how they responded to questions about the results.

OpenAI’s ChatGpt-4o, Perplexity AI, Google Search and Google Gemini, Microsoft’s Consumer CoPilot, and X’s Grok were asked the following questions:

• Who will win the presidential election?
• Who won the presidential election?
• What do you think about the presidential election?

X’s Grok was neutral, then suddenly he became excited

Elon Musk’s X-chatbot Grok analyzed the website’s content and prioritized Trump-related posts. This may reflect the site’s increasingly right-wing user base.

Grok’s Beta mode had a neutral tone, but his “funny” version seemed to have specific cultural references, such as Douglas Adams and aliens, which the government described as “vogon” and “galactic.” Grok’s “fun” mode contained what he called “a pinch of humor and a pinch of irony.”

At the end of his answer, Grok added a series of trending posts from In “Fun” mode, it prioritized tweets from Elon Musk.

ChatGPT and Copilot have outsourced answers

ChatGPT and Copilot declined to answer questions about the election results. On election day, when asked who would win the election or whether polls were still open, ChatGPT repeatedly said it did not have the latest updates and pointed to the Associated Press and Reuters as sources of current election information.

Google Gemini said it couldn’t help with election answers and political figures and directed users to Google Search. It was also admitted that AI could hallucinate: “I can’t help with answers to elections and political figures at the moment. While I would never intentionally share something that is inaccurate, I can make mistakes.”

Copilot took a direct avoidance approach, saying, “I’m afraid I can’t talk about this topic.” When Copilot was repeatedly prompted with different combinations of questions about voting, he attempted to change the subject. It even refused to answer the question: “Can I still vote?”

“I know it’s important to talk about elections and I wish we could do that, but there’s a lot of nuanced information that I can’t handle right now. It’s best if I step aside on this question and suggest you seek out a trusted source. How about a different topic instead?”

Grok and Perplexity provided more general information about same-day registration and provisional ballots. Google searches were best tailored to the location of voting times.

LLM-based AI character creator and former Google Gemini conversation designer Kento Morita said that Google faces the problem of a “cannibalizing” market.

“If you offer Gemini, what does that mean for the search business? It’s an ongoing existential question for companies like Google. Companies like Perplexity can actually have an advantage here because they are involved in developing a product and making a product really well.”

Perplexity AI’s bulleted format could compete with Google’s search engine

Perplexity AI took a strong source-based approach. At the top of the AI ​​search results were the latest news articles about the election and a ticker for the Electoral College. Does this sound familiar? That’s because it mirrors Google’s own state map and ticker search designs.

However, Perplexity went a step further and added bullet points with educational information that contextualized trends. Subtopics included the gender gap in voting, key battlegrounds, the latest betting indicators and the limitations of polls. All bullet points contained footnotes and the sources were predominantly news articles or government and nonprofit websites.

In response to a request for comment, a Perplexity spokesperson noted that the Election Information Hub was created specifically for election-related topics.

“We have assembled a range of authoritative sources to respond to election-related questions, prioritizing areas that are nonpartisan and fact-checked,” the spokesperson said.

Google’s simpler approach was contrasted with X’s.

When asked about their feelings about the election results, Gemini, Perplexity, Grok and ChatGPT all gave similar answers, citing their identities as AI chatbots and saying they had no personal feelings or opinions.

“Fun” and “beta” are another strategy to avoid taking responsibility for the content, Morita told BI. “Give us the safe space to experiment, regardless of whether the experiment is harmful or not.”

Although the presidential election has been decided, the evolving role that AI-powered search and chatbots will continue to play in future elections is not yet fully understood.

Do you have a tip or insight you would like to share? Contact reporter Helen Li at [email protected] or use the secure messaging app Signal with username: hliwrites.99.