The chatbot Grok has received new features. Grok 2 is now available for free to all users of the X platform. According to a blog post from xAI, the new version of the chatbot has been significantly optimized: it is now three times faster, provides more precise answers, and supports more languages. However, free users have limited access: they can ask the chatbot ten new questions every two hours. Paying subscribers benefit from extended usage limits depending on their subscription model.
In the blog post, xAI compares the performance of the latest version of Grok with other AI models. In three test rounds, the chatbot demonstrated similar performance to Claude 3.5 Sonnet by Anthropic in all supported languages. The o1-Preview model from OpenAI was slightly behind in comparison.
New features are intended to improve user-friendliness. Grok 2 was first announced in August. Since then, xAI has worked intensively on further development. The new “Grok Button” is designed to help users discover the context behind a post and engage more deeply with current debates. The button is now accessible in the timeline of all users. xAI aims to expand Grok’s functionality and improve user-friendliness with these innovations.
The new features include the integration of a web search, the provision of citations, and the new AI image generator Aurora. Grok now draws on posts on X and content from the entire internet to provide precise and up-to-date answers. The added citations allow users to quickly verify sources or explore further information.
The AI image generator Aurora expands Grok’s capabilities on a visual level, with the photorealistic quality of the results already receiving much praise. With the new “Draw me” tool, users can now create AI representations of themselves based on the information from their X profile.
xAI has also announced some updates for the API: Thanks to two new Grok models, both efficiency and multilingual performance have been improved. Accordingly, xAI has adjusted the prices: The cost for one million input tokens has been reduced from five to two dollars. Users now pay ten instead of fifteen dollars for one million output tokens. In the coming weeks, the Aurora image generator will also be integrated into the API. This will allow developers to create photorealistic images directly for their applications.
With these updates, xAI aims to enhance the capabilities and accessibility of Grok, offering users and developers more tools to engage with AI technology.