Microsoft's Bing has struggled for years to gain a foothold among search engines. But the company's recent deep dive into AI is breathing new life into it with its AI-powered Bing Chat feature. Often referred to as Bing ChatGPT, the new Bing is actually quite different from its more popular competitor. It uses GPT-4 and performs more as an AI-powered search engine in a conversational format.

Unlike ChatGPT, the new Bing has internet access, giving it the ability to provide more up-to-date responses. ChatGPT, in turn, is only trained on data up to the year 2021 thus it cannot provide answers on current events.

How to use the new Bing 

What you need: Getting started with the new Bing requires the use of Microsoft Edge and to log into a Microsoft account. When you access Microsoft Bing, you can choose whether to use the search or chat formats.

1. Open (or download) Edge and go to Bing

Open the Microsoft Edge web browser to access Bing. If you don't have it, you can download it for Windows, Mac, and Linux here -- it's also available on mobile for Android and iOS. 

Once you've got Edge open, go to Bing.com and either click on Chat at the top of the screen or, if available, on Try it or Learn more right below the search bar.

2. Log into your Microsoft account

If you're not logged into your account, you'll be prompted to do so when you go try Bing in chat mode. A Microsoft account could be an outlook.com or hotmail.com email address and password, or the login information you use for Microsoft services like Office, OneDrive, or Xbox. 

You can create an account using any email address, Gmail and Yahoo! included.

3. Choose Chat

From the search options below the search bar, click on Chat to access the new AI-powered Bing Chat.

4. Get to know Bing Chat

Microsoft's AI-powered Bing Chat is a bit different from the most popular AI chatbot at the moment, ChatGPT. While you ask prompts in a similar fashion, the format for the answers and conversation style is different