After what might have seemed like an eternity, Microsoft has now shipped Bing Chat to broad availability. This means that users interested in testing out the entry no longer need to sign up and join Microsoft’s waitlist to access it.
Back in February, the company indicated that it had expedited request approvals for users in a bid to get more people to try out the AI chatbot in preview.
Shortly after debuting the new Bing, Microsoft surpassed 100 million daily active users on Bing. The company attributes part of this success to the millions of users that signed up to preview the new Bing.
At some point, it even seemed that Microsoft had even done away with the waitlist after several users cited that they were able to access the new Bing at sign-up.
However, Microsoft later stated that the tool was still in preview and that the team behind it was running numerous tests which in turn accelerated the process thus allowing them to skip the waitlist.
The company has now confirmed that Bing Chat is in open preview. Users are still required to have a Microsoft Account to access the AI chatbot on mobile or Edge on the desktop.
In addition to the tool’s expanded availability to everyone, Microsoft has also indicated that there are lots of new features coming to Bing Chat including third-party plug-in support.
Bing Chat third-party plug-in support
The company has also highlighted its plans to incorporate smart features into its chatbot to enhance the user experience, including the much-requested feature to save chat history, plug-in support, and more.
Plug-in support has been a major concern, especially for developers. Microsoft has now confirmed that it will allow developers to create plug-ins for Bing Chat. The company has teamed up with OpenAI to add plug-in features to the chatbot.
According to Microsoft:
We’ll soon build third-party plug-ins into the Bing chat experience creating a platform for developers. For example, if you’re researching the latest restaurant for dinner in Bing chat, it will leverage OpenTable to help you find and book a reservation. Or, with Wolfram|Alpha, you can create powerful visualizations and get answers to complex science, math and human-curated data-based questions directly from Bing chat.
To that end, Microsoft has disclosed that it will share additional information at its developer conference Build 2023 which is scheduled to take place later this month from May 23 to May 24.
If you’ve been stuck on the waitlist and are yet to try out Bing Chat, now’s your chance. Share your experience with us in the comments.
via The Verge
