Which AI assistant should you use?

An AI assistant, or chatbot, is a program you talk to in plain language. Behind each one sits a large language model: software trained on huge amounts of text to predict good answers. They all write, summarise and answer questions. They differ in the extras, the limits, the price and what happens to your data.

This guide sorts them by the job you want done, not by a league table. Where we describe a strength, it is either what the maker says or what an independent reviewer found, and we say which.

Which assistants are we talking about?

Seven names cover most everyday use in October 2026:

• ChatGPT, from OpenAI.
• Claude, from Anthropic.
• Gemini, from Google.
• Microsoft Copilot, from Microsoft.
• Meta AI, from Meta, built into WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook.
• Mistral Vibe, from the French company Mistral AI. Until May 2026 it was called Le Chat, according to Wikipedia; heise reports the new name brings its chat assistant and its coding tool together.
• Perplexity, from Perplexity AI, an assistant built around web search.

What does each one cost?

All seven have a free version. The paid plans buy you higher limits and access to the makers' more capable models, more than a different product.

Assistant	Free tier	Main paid plan (monthly)	Strengths, per its maker	Where it works
ChatGPT	Yes, with limits	Go $8, Plus $20, Pro from $100	Wide set of tools: voice, images, deep research, projects	Web, desktop, phone apps
Claude	Yes	Pro $20 ($17 if paid yearly), Max from $100	Web search, file creation, memory, connected apps	Web, desktop, phone apps
Gemini	Yes	AI Plus $4.99, AI Pro $19.99, AI Ultra from $99.99	Images, Deep Research, Gemini Live voice, Google apps	Web, phone apps; Gmail, Docs and other Google apps on paid plans
Microsoft Copilot	Yes	Included in Microsoft 365 Personal $9.99, Family $12.99, Premium $19.99	Copilot inside Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook	Windows, web, phone apps, Microsoft 365 apps
Meta AI	Yes	Meta One Plus $7.99, Premium $19.99 (test markets only)	Image and video creation, reasoning	WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, Messenger
Mistral Vibe	Yes, with limits	Pro $14.99 (excluding tax)	Connectors, scheduled tasks, image generation	Web, phone apps
Perplexity	Yes	Pro $20, Max $200	Answers from web search with numbered citations	Web, phone apps

Prices are in US dollars as shown by each maker or, where the maker's page shows none, as reported by the press.

Some details behind those numbers. ChatGPT's pricing page did not display amounts when we checked; OpenAI's help pages give Plus at $20 and three Pro tiers at $100, $200 and $500 a month, and AI Business reported Go at $8 in the US. OpenAI says Go "may" show ads in future, and AI Business reported in January that OpenAI planned ad tests on the free and Go tiers in the US.

Perplexity's own pages list no prices; the $20 and $200 figures come from TechCrunch's report of July 2025. Mistral's pricing page showed Pro at $14.99, while heise reported €17.99 a month at the Vibe launch. Meta's paid plans were, according to The Next Web in May, rolling out first in Singapore, Guatemala and Bolivia.

Which is good for help with writing?

Every assistant can draft an email, tidy a paragraph or suggest a headline. What you put in matters as much as which tool you use: our guide on how to write a good prompt explains how to ask.

Zapier's reviewer, who tested the main chatbots for its annual roundup (reviewed for accuracy in May 2026), picked ChatGPT as "the best general-purpose chatbot" and Claude for writing and coding, praising its candid editing style. That is one reviewer's judgment, not a measurement. If you write inside Word or Google Docs, the assistant already built into those programs (Copilot or Gemini) may save you the copying and pasting.

Which is good for research with sources?

Perplexity is designed for this. Its help pages say it searches the internet and that "each answer includes numbered citations linking to the original sources". Zapier recommends it for "internet deep dives".

Anthropic lists web search in Claude's free plan, and OpenAI and Google both offer "deep research" modes for longer investigations, with limits on the free tiers. Whichever you use, click the citations. Chatbots can produce confident, wrong statements, known as hallucinations, and a link does not guarantee the page says what the summary claims.

Which is good for working with documents?

Most assistants let you upload a file and ask questions about it, but free versions cap how many and how large. Perplexity's help pages say its free plan has "limited basic file uploads", and OpenAI's pricing page lists file uploads as limited on ChatGPT Free.

Google's free plan includes Gemini Notebook, a tool for working across your own sources, and Gemini appears inside Gmail and Docs on paid plans. Microsoft 365 subscribers get Copilot in the desktop Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote apps, according to Microsoft. Anthropic lists Projects, a way to keep files and chats together, as a Pro feature. The amount of text an assistant can hold in mind at once is called its context window, and it is one reason long documents work better in some tools than others.

Which can make images?

Assistants that understand pictures as well as text are called multimodal. Most of the seven can both read an image you upload and create a new one, with one exception.

Google lists image generation and editing in Gemini's free plan. OpenAI lists image generation as limited on ChatGPT Free. Microsoft offers image creation in Copilot, with higher limits for Microsoft 365 subscribers. Mistral lists "basic image generation" on Vibe's free plan, and Perplexity lists image and video generation on Pro. Zapier names Meta AI as strongest for images and short videos. Claude is the exception: Anthropic says it "doesn't generate photos or illustrations the way image-generation tools do", though it can draw charts and diagrams.

Which works best on the phone or by voice?

Most have their own phone apps, and Meta AI lives inside apps you may already have. Meta AI is the easiest to reach if you use WhatsApp, because it is already there.

For talking out loud: Google's free plan includes Gemini Live, which can also look through your camera. OpenAI says free ChatGPT users get limited access to its Live voice mode, and that video and screen sharing need a paid plan's Advanced voice option. Anthropic says Claude's voice mode, in beta and in English, is rolling out to all plans on its mobile apps, with free users getting roughly 20 to 30 voice messages per session. Microsoft lists help "from your screen or camera" with higher usage on its paid plans.

Which is best if you care about privacy?

None of them is private by default in the way a notebook is. Your messages go to the company's computers, and several makers use conversations as training data for future models unless you say no. Our guide to your data and AI chatbots goes further.

What the makers say, in brief:

• ChatGPT: you can switch off "Improve the model for everyone" in Settings, Data controls. Temporary chats are not used for training but may be kept for up to 30 days, OpenAI says.
• Claude: chats are used for training only if you allow it in your privacy settings, says Anthropic; incognito chats are never used.
• Gemini: with "Keep Activity" on, Google uses your chats to improve its services, including training. Some chats are read by human reviewers. With it off, chats are still kept for 72 hours.
• Copilot: Microsoft uses conversations for training by default, but signed-in users can opt out at any time.
• Mistral Vibe: Mistral says inputs and outputs are used for training by default, and you can opt out.

Whatever you choose, keep passwords, health records and other people's personal details out of chatbots.

What about using them in the EU?

ChatGPT Go, OpenAI says, can be bought in every country where ChatGPT is supported, and Google says its paid AI plans are offered in more than 140 countries and territories. Mistral is a French company and lists euro prices.

Meta AI arrived in Europe later and smaller. TechCrunch reported in March 2025 that it launched across all 27 EU countries in six languages, but without image generation and other creative tools available in the US. Rules also differ here: the EU's AI Act sets duties for these companies, explained in our EU AI Act guide.

How should you choose?

Start free. Pick two or three that match your main task from the sections above, give each the same real question from your week, and compare the answers. Pay only when you keep hitting the free limits, and check that the plan you buy is the one that lifts the limit you hit.