Quick Guide to the Best AI Chatbots in 2026

AI chatbots are everywhere. How should you pick which one to use?

Whether you’re looking for quick answers or trying to build your own AI chatbot, we can help you discover the best AI chatbots on the market today.

The best AI chatbots are built on a handful of major LLMs – either their own chatbot interfaces, or used as an engine to power customized chatbots. Many of these companies offer both: an AI model and a chat interface.

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There are similarities: The major generative AI chatbots can all generate text, source information, and analyze images, to varying degrees of satisfaction. They all offer multilingual support, from a handful of languages to over 80, and most of them offer a free version to get started.

But these conversational AI platforms differ wildly in their strengths and weaknesses. Some can handle far larger documents, some are skilled in data analysis. Some give far more accurate answers, and others act more as an AI assistant, plugged into your knowledge base.

The best AI chatbot for you will depend on what you want to use it for. In this article, we’ll explain the pros and cons of each of the best AI chatbots available.

What is an AI chatbot?

An AI chatbot is a software application designed to mimic human conversation. Powered by artificial intelligence, AI chatbots are used for digital communication and system management.

Generative AI chatbots refer to any artificial intelligence chatbot that generates unique content, be it text, images, or video.

AI chatbots are often powered by large language models (LLMs) to generate text with just a few clicks. An AI chatbot refers to the back-and-forth conversational interface you converse with, while LLMs are the AI model behind the scenes.

If you’re looking to build your own AI chatbot, you can use an open-source language model. If you’re looking to incorporate an AI chat into your web page, developing mobile apps, or just want a personalized AI assistant, then the best AI chatbot for you will be a custom one built on a chatbot platform.

What should I look for in an AI chatbot?

The best AI chatbot for you depends on your purpose. Do you want an AI writer that helps you write research grants? Do you want to build a customized customer service AI chatbot?

If you want help figuring out slang words you can use to embarrass your kid, go with a major model. ChatGPT (particularly GPT-4) is widely considered the best AI chatbot for general use. While GPT-4 is currently the paid version, GPT-3.5 is the well-regarded free version of ChatGPT.

If you’re personalizing a chatbot – for yourself, or for your employees, customers, leads, or users – you want to find a chatbot platform that allows you to customize your AI bots.

A chatbot platform lets you connect your chatbot to your internal knowledge base, like a website or product catalog. If you’re building a bot to help your customer support team, you can build a bot that conducts user conversations without straying from your brand guidelines.

What can I use an AI chatbot for?

As AI chatbots develop agentic capabilities (i.e. they become more similar to AI agents), they’ve exploded across industries.

While the chatbots of yesteryear were largely used for unsatisfactory customer service conversations, the chatbots of 2024 are a new breed. Agentic chatbots can:

• Book a meeting
• Answer complex customer queries
• Provide sourced research
• Provide personalized recommendations from a set catalog

AI chatbots are exceptionally common when enhancing customer engagement, managing human resources, and providing IT support.

Why? These processes are chock-full of repetitive tasks and queries, so they’re easily aided by chatbots. And chatbots are pretty good at it: one of our clients was able to divert tech support calls away from live agents 500% more after using a professionalized chatbot platform.

Or take one of our partner organizations: they consistently implement AI chatbots in hotels that can handle 75% of all guest queries and requests without ever escalating to a human conversation. Not only were guests more satisfied with the service, but employees were relieved to spend more time on the tasks that mattered.

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While we tend to think of chatbots as a burden to user interactions, a properly built and deployed chatbot does wonders for user experience and ROI.

And with a flexible platform, the sky's the limit – you can create bots that schedule your day, handle customer conversations from start to finish, generate leads, send sports scores over WhatsApp, or annotate your meeting notes.

List of the Best AI Chatbots

1. ChatGPT
2. Claude
3. Gemini
4. Llama
5. Copilot
6. Grok

We’ve chosen these AI chatbots based on their power, usability, and capabilities. This round-up also features the current big players in the large language model (LLM) field. That means any AI chatbot you use – from your customer service bot to a personal assistant to an AI writer – will be powered by these engines. At least until the next big LLM development.

Below, we dive into each of these models, including the biggest pros and cons. But to get to the real question: what’s the best AI chatbot?

The unsatisfactory answer is that the best AI chatbot will depend on what you want to use it for. If you want to help your teenager figure out pre-calc, Socratic from Google is the best AI chatbot. If you want a personalized AI assistant, you'll want to customize with a chatbot platform.

But in a word? ChatGPT.

OpenAI’s models typically win in across-the-board rankings:

• ChatGPT provides top-ranked text generation (if you know how to prompt it)
• It’s easily connectable across other platforms and channels (if you code or use a chatbot platform)
• Even if you don’t shell out for GPT-4, its free version (GPT-3.5) is still incredibly powerful

OpenAI definitely got a leg up from their initial debut. As the first massive LLM to come into the public eye, ChatGPT has become synonymous with AI chatbots.

But OpenAI has put in the work to uphold their status. Their upcoming partnership with Apple shows that they’re certainly here to stay, despite the wave of competitors emerging from every major tech company.

Honorable mentions

While these AI chatbots didn’t make the final list, they do what they do well. They’re worth checking out if you have a specific, narrow purpose in mind.

The best AI chatbots for us aren’t always the most powerful. Sometimes a niche AI model is exactly what you need.

With the never ending influx of AI tools, you can find a solution for nearly any need. And if you can’t, it’s becoming easier and easier to build one yourself.

Socratic

If you’re looking for: A child-friendly, educational AI chatbot

If your kid wants help with their homework, then Google’s Socrates is your AI bot.

Socratic provides study assistance across subjects, from science and math to literature and drama. Its incredible ability to break down complex topics makes it perfect for students of all ages (try asking it to explain quantum entanglement).

One of its strongest features? It’s solidly multimodal: show it a math equation and it can break down the next step. Ask the difference between obtuse and acute; it can show you a diagram.

Socratic is the AI chatbot that we dream of in a world with no security or safety concerns. It exists only to help us understand the world through pretty pictures. If that’s not one of the best chatbots on the market, what is?

Give it a whirl by asking it to explain long division, the American electoral system, or how your national tax system really works.

Perplexity.ai

If you’re looking for: An accurate search of content on the web

Perplexity is an AI search engine chatbot powered by OpenAI’s GPT models. Launched in 2022, it’s particularly adept at sourcing information for its responses.

You can use Perplexity to limit your search to certain platforms (like help forums or academic papers). It also offers the ability to summarize documents and organize information, taking it a step further than previous search engines.

Perplexity is your best bet if you’re looking to conduct accurate research for school or work. It names sources, summarizes web content, and to some extent, helps you make sense of it.

Give it a whirl if you’re looking to switch up your online search habits.

Pi

If you’re looking for: Personal companionship

Did you watch Spike Jonze’s Her? So did the creators of Pi.

Developed by Inflection AI, Pi was designed as a supportive personal companion, mimicking empathy and human connection. Its purpose isn’t for seeking facts, but providing support that many lack in a digital era.

Pi isn’t just an homage to the irrational number (or the titular character in Yann Martel’s best-selling novel) – it stands for ‘personal intelligence’. They brand their AI chatbot as ‘the first emotionally intelligent AI.

While major players like OpenAI and Anthropic are focused more on enterprise than personal use, the rise of AI chatbots has been accompanied by a surge in searches for personal companionship. Loneliness pays, and AI companions will only grow in popularity.

Give it a whirl if you’re looking for advice, a pat on the back, or someone to remind you that you’re doing your best.

Jasper

If you’re looking for: Content creation tools

If content creation is your goal, try Jasper.

Jasper is an AI writer chatbot – it’s designed to write content for marketing teams. It assists marketers with strategy, writing, and editing. And it even boasts image generation to go along with it.

Its integration capabilities allow users to easily bring their AI text to Google Docs, Zapier, or Webflow.

AI chatbots are increasingly used as content creation tools, but this strategy can go south if you’re using a model that isn’t attuned to how humans write (or you don’t know how to edit). But Jasper allows corporate branding that models like GPT-4 aren’t designed for.

Give it a whirl if you’re tired of writing, and want to see what AI has come up with so far.

Now, onto the best AI chatbots on the market today. We'll begin with the biggest fish of them all:

1. ChatGPT by OpenAI

If you’ve heard of one AI chatbot, it’s ChatGPT.

It was its 2022 release that skyrocketed AI to the top of the public radar – long gone are the days where you could open a magazine or social media feed without being accosted by headlines condemning or condoning the rise of artificial intelligence.

ChatGPT has over 200 million monthly users, making it the most popular conversational AI chatbot by volume. And they’re backed by big players: their partnership with Apple will allow users to harness the capabilities of ChatGPT without switching between tools.

But bells, whistles, and accolades aside, ChatGPT is usually seen as the best general purpose AI model on the market.

It can act as an AI writer, solve problems, communicate with voice chat, complete data analysis, and process images. It gives relevant answers, although users need to understand how to prompt it for the desired results.

For those who approach daily LLM use with hesitation, it's a user-friendly option to introduce newcomers to human-AI interaction. Its interface allows you to save an AI chat and revisit it later – it’s one of the few models that provide easy-access conversation history in the always-present sidebar.

And for the experts or curious bot builders, the OpenAI API is a popular choice amongst developers. OpenAI allows users to build custom GPTs for personalized use, and powers many of the leading chatbots on agent-building platforms.

OpenAI’s latest model was GPT-4o – a big multimodal jump from GPT-4. The product launch demonstrated the easy back-and-forth nature of its new voice chat capabilities – users can interrupt the AI system, or ask for a tonal change.

The current free version of ChatGPT is GPT-3.5, while the more advanced features of GPT-4 are $20/month for individual users. But they allow limited use of GPT-4o is part of OpenAI’s free plan, and the model is much faster and cheaper then its predecessor. If you’re looking for a chatbot, its price and speed make GPT-4o a game-changer for scalability.

And what’s ahead for ChatGPT? GPT-5 is set to drop later this year. The model is claimed to be smarter, more reliable, and more multimodal than GPT-4.

As the reigning king, chatbot users will eagerly await whether upcoming models can supercede ChatGPT’s capabilities. But for now, ChatGPT remains at the top of AI chatbot general tests.

Quick Facts

Price: You can access GPT-3.5 and GPT-4o (sometimes) for free. For $20/month, ChatGPT Plus gets you additional access to GPT-4, GPT-4o, custom GPTs, and DALL E image generation.

If you’re looking to use the GPT engines to build your own chatbot, the cost of input and output tokens varies based on the model you use. You can see OpenAI’s full pricing page here.

Context window: 128,000 tokens

Supported languages: ChatGPT supports over 80 languages. Read the full list of languages supported by ChatGPT.

Benefits

One feature of ChatGPT that sets it apart from competitors is its ability to save past conversations. While AI chatbots like Gemini don’t allow you to view past chats, ChatGPT keeps your chat history in an easy-to-click sidebar.

Particularly with the introduction of GPT-4o, ChatGPT supports an advanced voice mode, beyond the abilities of its competitors. You can communicate back and forth with ChatGPT, closely mimicking human conversation.

With their advanced image generation, you can highlight specific sections of an output image that you want to change – ChatGPT will alter only the specified sections.

Have a data-related task? ChatGPT allows you to directly upload files from your computer. Feed it a spreadsheet and ask for an analysis – and while you’re at it, and accompanying series of graphs.

ChatGPT allows you to build custom GPTs, without limits.

GPT-4 provides clickable links to source the information it outputs – no more opening a new tab to navigate cross-referencing.

Drawbacks

Unlike some other AI chatbots, ChatGPT has static training data - as it acknowledges when prompted on its own drawbacks - so it’s limited in its ability to provide real-time information.

Unlike options like Gemini, image generation is a paid feature.

If you’re looking to use an LLM to assist in coding tasks, Claude 3.5 Sonnet is better suited for quick use by developers than GPT-4o.

2. Claude by Anthropic

Claude is the AI chatbot developed by Anthropic, released in March 2023. Their latest model is Claude 3.5 Sonnet, released June 2024.

Claude 3.5 debuted to wide acclaim, with many marking it at the top of the best AI chatbots. The new AI model is available via a free plan. The update received far more advanced features and capabilities than Claude 3 – it’s better at coding (even better than GPT-4) and

The latest models have advanced recall capabilities, able to accurately retrieve information from large datasets.

Claude is known as a model to prioritize safety and reliability: it was designed to remain neutral and avoid human bias in its responses. Its standard line – that it’s ‘helpful, honest, and harmless’ – directly addresses the backlash that other LLM models have received over the past few years.

The Claude models were finetuned with Constitutional AI, Anthropic’s approach to making AI chatbots harmless to their users.

Claude’s integration potential isn’t limited to a specific company’s ecosystem (looking at you, Llama and Copilot). You can integrate Claude with a variety of external tools, so it’s more adaptable to different contexts. It can generate structured outputs through API calls, or provide technical analyses across industries, unlike other chatbots.

Quick Facts

Price: You can access Claude for free if you have a cell phone number. Claude Pro costs $20 per month, while Team is $25/person each month

Context window: Claude 3 models have a context window of 200,000 tokens

Supported languages: More than 12. Anthropic says that Claude is especially good in English, Portuguese, French and German

Benefits

Claude features sophisticated vision capabilities: it excels at interpreting images and creating new visuals. When it comes to visual data processing, it’s one of the best on the table.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet performs better on coding tasks than GPT-4o.

Thanks to Anthropic’s Constitutional AI, Claude is arguably one of the safer LLMs at the top. However, most chatbot platforms offer enhanced security features for AI chatbot use.

Its integration capabilities make it more versatile than the bare OpenAI engine.

Drawbacks

Claude is, straight up, bad at math.

Claude isn’t as good at creative writing tasks – like writing an article, resume, or poem – as ChatGPT.

Anthropic instituted a strict ban on Claude imitating personas or any kind of role-playing, which limits the range of questions and answers it can handle.

3. Gemini by Google

Do you remember past AI offerings PaLM 2, LaMDA and Bard? What about the ancient Google Assistant? All defunct, Google has rebranded the lot as Gemini.

Google’s Gemini collection of large language models (LLMs) replaced their original LLMs, LaMDA and PaLM 2, as well as Google Assistant. Gemini is the name for both the AI chatbot and the large language model it runs on – though the chatbot alone initially debuted as Bard.

Google’s Gemini is often seen as the closest competitor to the ubiquitous ChatGPT. Its superpower? Gemini’s built-in integrations with the extensive Google Suite. That means Google apps like Docs, Gmail and Calendar can connect directly to Gemini, so you can reference information from Drive files or even update your agenda just by prompting.

One of its advanced features is its massive context window. A bigger context window means that Gemini is able to process far more input at once than its competitors. You can feed Gemini a much longer document than other LLMs.

Another feature is its integration with Google apps. If you use Google Photos, you can ask Gemini to find a photo with you and your sister standing in front of a lake, or a flower that looked like an eye. It will bring up all the images that match your verbal description.

But beyond Google Photos, Gemini has plenty of Google apps at its fingertips. Powered by Google’s online search, Gemini can connect to workspace tools like Gmail, Docs, and Sheets.

In the Google suite, Gemini can summarize content and provide advanced analyses. These capabilities are most useful for those who work extensively with the Google ecosystem.

Quick facts

Price: For API use, Gemini offers a free plan and a pay-as-you plan. You can see the full pricing structure here

Context window: 1,000,000 tokens

Supported languages: Over 35 languages

Benefits

If you pay for Gemini Advanced, you can directly upload documents and request insights or feedback. This is a new feature, so while it’s limited now, expect it to improve soon.

Gemini’s biggest medals are its integrations across the powerful, ubiquitous Google Suite.

Because of its tight Google link, Gemini can source images from Google search, something beyond the abilities of ChatGPT. It can also export answers directly to Google Docs or Gmail.

Gemini lets users generate AI images for free, a unique feature in the current LLM landscape.

You can let your friend pick up the chat where you left it off by sending your Gemini chat – they can start interacting in the conversation seamlessly.

Drawbacks

Aside from the all-powerful Google Suite, Gemini doesn’t offer integrations to other platforms or channels. If you want flexibility and versatility, you’re better off with an option like ChatGPT.

Gemini isn’t as advanced in voice mode as ChatGPT. While it can read answers out loud, it can’t conduct a human-like back-and-forth conversation.

4. Llama by Meta

Like most major LLMs, Meta’s went through a branding switch up, originally introduced to the public as LLaMA in February 2023. Their latest model, Llama 3, was released in April 2024.

Llama 3 is available in parameters sizes of 8B and 70B, and was trained on a 15 trillion token dataset (~7x larger than Llama 2).

Still in a growth phase, Llama is gradually rolling out worldwide. It’s now available in over a dozen countries. And as part of their ongoing growth, each Meta LLM becomes more multimodal. Llama 3 received a boost with enhanced image creation and editing, letting users generate new visuals or tweak existing ones.

As for integration capabilities, the Meta model is easily connectable to its other platforms, like Facebook, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp. However, due to the popularity of these channels, most chatbot platforms offer these integrations out of the box.

One of the key advantages of Llama 3 is that it's open-source – Llama’s source code, training methodology, and the model itself are publicly available. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has claimed their AI models will remain open-source as long as it is strategically sound to do so.

Quick Facts

Price: Free. For everyone, all the time. For now.

Context window: 8,000 tokens for Llama 3

Supported languages: Llama 3 supports over 10 languages, but is focused on development in English

Benefits

Llama 3 was strategically released by Meta as a completely free, as well as open-source.

Tests conducted by Meta AI have shown that Llama 3 (70B), can beat Google Gemini and Anthropic’s Claude in certain benchmarks (although this was before the release of Claude 3.5 Sonnet).

Easily connect to the Meta suite: Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram.

Drawbacks

Meta is still developing Llama’s multimodal capabilities – it’s mainly for text in its current form.

Llama doesn’t have multilingual capabilities yet – multi language support is another feature presumed to be in production.

5. Copilot by Microsoft

Microsoft’s Copilot is powered by – you guessed it – OpenAI’s GPT models. Launched in February 2023, Copilot is Microsoft’s main replacement for Cortana, its previous AI chatbot.

A model by many names, it was formerly Bing Chat, but gradually transitioned to Copilot over 2023.

Copilot is designed to supercharge productivity across the Microsoft 365 applications. You know the big players: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Teams, Outlook. In Microsoft Teams, you can use Copilot to summarize meetings, track action items, and facilitate note-taking while a meeting is in progress.

It can add images to PowerPoint, summarize email threads in Outlook, analyze Excel data, and suggest when to schedule a meeting based on an email exchange.

Copilot is easily used via Microsoft Edge, the company’s web browser. Users can access it in the sidebar and ask Copilot to compare skateboard brands or suggest what kind of plant you should buy for an east-facing window.

If you’re looking to build your own AI chatbot, you can do so in Microsoft's Copilot Studio.

If you’re an avid user of the extended Microsoft suite and you’re looking to enhance your daily processes with artificial intelligence, then Copilot might be the AI chatbot for you.

Quick Facts

Price: Most Copilot features are available in its free tier. Microsoft Copilot Pro adds newer features and custom chatbot creation for $20 per month for individuals.

Context window: 128,000 tokens (since it’s powered by GPT)

Supported languages: Copilot currently supports 27 languages

Benefits

Microsoft Copilot shines in its ability to source up-to-date information. It links back to sources, unlike ChatGPT, so you can reference where the output information is sourced from.

If you’re a die-hard fan of Microsoft suite – Word, Outlook, PowerPoint and Excel being the heaviest hitters – Copilot can easily integrate across your existing systems.

Copilot is built into Microsoft Edge, for all the die-hard Edgers out there. If Edge is your typical browser, it’s easy to incorporate into your daily tasks.

Drawbacks

Copilot is largely reliant on the Microsoft ecosystem. If you want to use an AI chatbot outside of these environments, you’re better off finding an option with more integration capabilities.

For enterprise use, Microsoft Copilot is more costly than its counterparts.

6. Grok by xAI

Elon Musk has his name attached to more than one leading AI chatbot – not only was he initially a Board of Directors member at OpenAI, he founded one of their latest competitors: xAI.

Grok is the AI chatbot of xAI – its main feature is that its integrated with X (formerly known as Twitter). This allows it to provide real-time responses and remain up to date with current events.

As a social media-based AI chatbot, Grok is designed to be multimodal. It can process and produce text and images. Since the model is specialized in processing social media content, Grok will be especially suitable for marketers and those looking to analyze real-time events.

The Grok model has a large context window for being a new model. It parallels ChatGPT, even though it’s in early editions.

Grok is open-source, with its weights and architecture freely available – developers can modify and use their own versions of the model.

Quick Facts

Price: Grok is currently only available via an early access program, though it will soon be rolled out worldwide

Context window: 128,000

Supported languages: Grok is currently only available in English

Benefits

Grok can handle multiple queries at the same time, unlike other AI chatbots.

The xAI model is in tune to current events, more than the average person. Since it’s hooked up to X, Grok is minutely up-to-date on world events and attitudes.

The AI chatbot is – subjectively – known for an engaging and witty disposition. The entertainment factor hasn’t been emphasized in previous chatbots, setting it apart from its competitors.

Drawbacks

Grok is still in development, which means it doesn’t yet have the multilingual support of other chatbots.

In its current form, Grok is a text generating chatbot, though it may include multimodal features down the line.

Deploying Grok (especially the more advanced versions) requires significant computational resources that may be out of reach for individual developers.

The Best AI Chatbots are Evolving

Three years ago, few of us could have predicted the massive rise in AI technology, let alone the ubiquity it’s cemented in a minuscule timespan.

In two to three years’ time, the abilities of models like GPT-4 and Claude 3.5 Sonnet will be dwarfed by the latest chatbots, AI agents, and LLM models.

Our comparisons will no longer focus on features like conversation history. Context windows will reach a new high. Data analysis will be performed by AI systems before informing human-led analysis and decision-making. Even the free version of a mid-tier LLM will exceed today’s top performers.

If you’re weary of updating your chatbot every time a new LLM is released, consider using a chatbot platform that automatically updates your bots to the latest technology. We provide access to the latest LLMs within days of release for every chatbot built on Botpress.

AI chatbot technology will continue to rapidly update. Instead of falling behind, keep your chatbots updated, too.

Build a Custom AI Chatbot

If you’re looking to integrate AI chatbots into your day-to-day work processes, you likely want to build your own.

There are a lot of advantages to making your own bot: customization, integration to other platforms, and enhanced security, to name a few.

If you want to deploy your bot to users other than yourself – like your employees, users, or customers – you’ll need to customize an AI chatbot. With the plethora of chatbot platforms out there, it’s easy to set up an AI chatbot to fulfill your specific needs.

If you’re interested in finding an AI chatbot tool to help you personalize a bot (or create a powerful AI agent), you can read our list of the 9 best chatbot platforms to get you started.

Building chatbots and AI agents is what we do best. If you’re interested in making chatbots work for you, start building today or reach out to our team.

FAQ

1. What are the best AI chatbots?

The best AI chatbots include platforms like Botpress, Intercom Fin, Drift, and Zendesk AI, depending on the user’s use case. The best chatbots offer natural conversation, integrate with your existing systems, support customization, and provide user-friendly interfaces for both customers and builders.

2. How do AI chatbots work?

AI chatbots work by using natural language processing (NLP) to interpret user input and machine learning (ML) or large language models (LLMs) to generate appropriate responses. AI chatbots can be rule-based or generative, and may integrate with APIs or databases to provide adaptive answers.

3. What’s the difference between AI models and AI chatbots?

AI models are the underlying engines, such as GPT-4, Claude, or Gemini, that process and generate language. AI chatbots are applications built on top of these models, adding conversation flow logic, integrations, and UI elements to turn the models into usable products.

4. Can I make an AI chatbot for free?

Yes, you can make an AI chatbot for free using platforms like Botpress or Sendbird. Most free plans allow building and deploying bots on basic channels, with limitations usually around usage volume, integrations, or advanced AI features.