Brief Summary
This video provides a comprehensive guide to using Perplexity, an AI-powered search and information retrieval tool. It differentiates Perplexity from other AI tools like ChatGPT and Google Gemini, highlighting its strengths in delivering accurate, real-time information. The video covers settings, search functionalities, the Collections feature, limitations, and Pro features, offering practical examples and use cases.
- Perplexity excels at providing accurate, real-time information compared to creative tasks.
- The Collections feature is a standout for organizing research and applying custom prompts.
- Perplexity Pro offers enhanced search capabilities and access to advanced models, but the free version is sufficient for most users.
Perplexity is positioned as an AI tool that excels in delivering accurate and real-time information, distinguishing it from tools like ChatGPT and Google Gemini, which are designed for creative tasks. While ChatGPT and Gemini are better for brainstorming and writing where factual accuracy isn't critical, Perplexity is more suitable when a high level of confidence in the answer is needed, such as for health or technical troubleshooting. The video also jokingly places Reddit as an "undisputed single source of truth," highlighting the varying degrees of reliability among online sources.
Perplexity allows users to exclude their data from its training process while still maintaining access to their conversation history. The video addresses a common misconception that the Pro version grants access to other paid AI tools like ChatGPT, clarifying that while you can select their models, the fine-tuning methods differ, with Perplexity optimized for accuracy and speed. The profile tab includes a self-introduction section, similar to ChatGPT's custom instructions, where users can input instructions that apply to all conversations within Perplexity. Customizing this section is highly recommended to tailor the AI's responses to specific needs.
Perplexity's "focus" feature allows users to narrow down the sources used for search, improving output quality. Options include searching the entire web, focusing on academic sources, social media, or videos, depending on the query. The "writing" option is Perplexity's attempt at a creative model, but the presenter finds ChatGPT and Google Gemini superior for creative writing. Free users can attach PDFs but not images, though converting images to PDF is a workaround. A real-world example demonstrates how Perplexity provides specific instructions to solve a Wi-Fi connection issue, drawing from various sources like Apple's and Marriott's help centers, and Reddit posts.
The Collections feature is highlighted as a standout, allowing users to save research and apply AI prompts to entire collections. Using a trip to Japan as an example, the presenter shows how to create a collection and instruct Perplexity to act as a seasoned travel agent, tailoring responses to the user's situation. For more advanced use, collections can be instructed to generate structured outlines for presentations, following frameworks like the SCQA framework used by consulting firms. The presenter expresses greater confidence in the data provided by Perplexity due to the consistent inclusion of sources for almost every bullet point. Collections can be accessed and edited in the library tab.
Perplexity is compared to ChatGPT and Google Gemini in a brainstorming task for YouTube thumbnail ideas, revealing that Perplexity does not perform as well in creative tasks. The ideas generated by ChatGPT were more creative and relevant. This reinforces the idea that Perplexity competes more with Google AI Overviews, which also prioritize accuracy in their answers, rather than with more creatively oriented models like Gemini or ChatGPT.
The Pro version of Perplexity allows users to set preferred text-to-text and text-to-image models, with the FLUX model noted as a popular image generation option. Image generation is exclusive to Pro users. Pro users also get 600 daily Pro Searches, which consider more sources and provide more detailed answers compared to regular searches. The video briefly mentions other features like generating blog posts and a "Discover" tab, but notes they were not covered due to the presenter's limited use of them. The "labs.perplexity.ai" is a playground environment for developers to test Perplexity's large language models.
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Transcript
Full transcript of “Learn 80% of Perplexity in under 10 minutes!”. Click a timestamp to open the video at that moment. Need another video? Use the YouTube transcript generator.
0:00 here's a non-nonsense guide to using perplexity first up while many of you are familiar with Chach BT and Google Gemini you might not know where perplexity fits in your AI toolkit imagine a spectrum on one end we have tools like chbt and Gemini designed for high brain power creative tasks on the other end are tools like perplexity and Google search which excel at delivering accurate and realtime information and of course we can't forget all the way to the right in a league of its own we have the internet's un disputed single source of Truth Reddit put simply for tasks like brainstorming editing and writing where you don't care about factual accuracy Chachi and Gemini definitely deliver better outputs but if you need a relatively high level of confidence in
0:45 your answer like deciding which supplements to take or troubleshooting software issues perplexity is the way to go diving right into the settings I really like how perplexity lets us exclude our data from their training process while still allowing us to access a conversation history under the library tab I'll talk about the pro features at the very end since this video is mainly on the free version but first I need to debunk a myth other creators are saying buying the pro version of perplexity does not give you access to other paid AI tools like chat gbt even if you can select their models here this is because even if they use the same underlying model chat gbt and perplexity apply completely different fine-tuning methods for example perplexity optimizes for accuracy speed
1:31 and a more search oriented approach if you don't know what fine-tuning means check out my video summarizing Google's intro to AI course but the bottom line here is even if you can select the same models you do not get the same experience as the other AI tools next moving on to the profile tab this self- inroduction section works just like chatab BT's custom instructions as in the instructions you add here apply to all conversations within perplexity for example Le my instruction include structure your writing and respond like a consultant adopt a conversational tone use Simple language Etc and since we only need to add this once to benefit forever I highly recommend customizing this to fit your needs if you're feeling a bit lazy I'll leave a link down below
2:17 to my custom instructions and I'll also leave a link to my workspace toolkit if you want to make a copy of my favorite prompts for productivity now let's actually start using perplexity by going back to the Home tab where you'll see the focus feature this basically lets you narrow down the sources you want perplexity to use which can drastically improve the quality of your output for example if I'm searching for realtime news like nvidia's most recent earnings call I want to search the entire web for queries around fish oil supplements I would focus on academic sources for gym workout recommendations I might turn to Social and if I wanted to learn how to perform a specific exercise I might want to watch some videos the writing option is perplexity attempt at offering a more
3:03 creative oriented model and as you can see it generates text without searching the web but again in my own personal experience I found the paid versions of chat GPT and Google Gemini to be much better at creative writing the attach feature is a bit weird in that free users can only attach and upload PDFs but not images at the same time though we can just convert images to PDFs and upload those so I guess that's a workaround now let's go through a real world use case how to force Wi-Fi connection after connecting to Marriott Wi-Fi on an iPhone since I chose to search the entire web we can see that perplexity Drew from a variety of sources from Apple's help center to Merit help center to Reddit post I can click here to expand all sources and I can even choose to remove sources that
3:49 are outdated or unreliable scrolling down we see the true power of perplexity instead of clicking to multiple links on Google to find the right answer we are literally giving given a set of instructions to follow uh by the way this actually works if you connect to a public network but don't see the login page you can literally just type in example.com in your browser and this forces the connection on the right is what I call supplementary information uh perplexity correctly identified that a might be easier for me to watch a video to troubleshoot my issue so provided a few videos here in other instances it might search for images to help with my query here's an example directly comparing perplexity to Google I search for a country with with the most gold medals in the most recent Olympics uh I actually didn't know the answer going to this by the way I didn't watch the
4:35 Olympics except for the break dancing part and uh on Google if I click into the first link it tells me the number of gold medals each country has won in the entire history of the Olympics not from the most recent one which is a little bit awkward and even more Awkward I had to scroll all the way down to the fifth link here for me to find that oh in the most recent Olympics uh the US and China tied in the number of gold medals and that was a lot of clicking around and reading to find the information we wanted right when I type the same query into perplexity we actually get the correct answer right away and perplexity even includes a bit of trivia saying this is the first time in Olympic history that two countries finish with the exact same number of gold medals um
5:22 in the summer games and Google's defense I think an apple to Apple comparison would have been to compare perplexity to Google's AI overview featur since those two are in the same category let me know in the comments if you want to see a video on that next up let's talk about my favorite feature and perplexity collections diving right into an example I'm actually visiting Japan later this year so I ask perplexity when to visit if I want to avoid the peak tourist season since I know I'll be doing more research over the next few weeks I can click the three dots up here add to collection and click new collection and then give this title trip to Japan 2 since I already have an existing collection from previously and down here I can add an AI prompt that will apply to the entire collection in this case I
6:08 tell perplexity to assume the role of a seasoned travel agent with over 20 years of experience helping tourists uncover hidden gems in Japan when providing recommendations prioritize local experiences that are tourist friendly and now whenever I start a new conversation or thread in this collection uh perplexity will remember to assume the role of a travel agent and give me answers tailored to my situation next you have a slightly more advanced use case as you can see I've instructed this collection to generate a structured outline uh for tens SL presentation following the scqa framework used by top consulting firms I'll leave a link to this the full prompt down below now whenever I create a new thread in this collection for example gaming trends for the next few years and the impact on app developers which is a topic related to
6:54 my full-time job by the way uh perplexity delivers an outline for a presentation I can start building on immediately and although this workflow can also be achieved using custom gbts and Gemini gems I'm much more confident in the numbers and data here since almost every single one of these bullet points have sources attached to them and to wrap up you can access all your collections by clicking into the library Tab and you can also make edits to the entire collection by clicking the three dots here and clicking edit collection so far we focus on the positives so now let's dive into an example where perplexity doesn't perform very well compared to chat and Google Gemini here I use the same prompt and ask chat PT and perplexity to help me brainstorm thumbnail ideas for this video you're
7:41 watching I'm not going to read the responses but if you pause the video you will see chp's ideas are much more creative and relevant and I ended up creating my thumbnail based on one of these ideas obviously this is just one example but I can constantly tell you that as of right now you're much better off using chat GPT or Google Gemini for highb brain intensive creative tasks and that's also another reason why perplexity is competing more with Google AI overviews than gemini or Chachi BT since AI overviews also provides answers with a higher degree of accuracy theoretically speaking moving on although I pay for perplexity Pro most users will be just fine with a free version as a pro user you can first set your um preferred text to text and text
8:26 to image models as mentioned before it is worth mentioning that uh flux is a very popular image generation model right now and generating images is also a pro only feature in perplexity paid users can also use the pro search feature up to 600 times a day as opposed to just five times uh Pro Searchers basically takes into account more sources and the answers are more detailed than what you would get from a regular quick search and that basically sums up the number of differences between Pro and free there are some perplexity features I didn't touch on today today simply because I don't use them for example if you click the plus icon here uh you can create a page where perplexity generates an entire blog post for you based on your initial prompt and
9:12 if I wanted to I could click here to publish the page and this might show up in the Discover tab which acts like a personalized news feed but I'm just not sure I want to be reading AI generated articles all day so finally if you head on over to labs. perplexity uh this playground acts like a Sandbox environment where developers can test out perplexities large language models before integrating them into their own applications if you found this video helpful I have an entire playlist where I break down complex AI topics for beginners see you on the next video in the meantime have a great one
