ChatGPT Search no longer requires an OpenAI account to use

OpenAI is showing no signs of slowing down its recent pace of updates. On Wednesday, the company announced the expanded availability of ChatGPT Search. After rolling out the tool first to paid subscribers last fall, and then making it available to all logged-in free users at the end of 2024, now anyone can use ChatGPT Search with no account or sign-in necessary.

“Like the logged-in experience, ChatGPT can search the web and get you fast, timely answers with links to relevant web sources directly in ChatGPT,” OpenAI said.

In most cases, ChatGPT will automatically search the web to source the most up-to-date information related to your question. Users can also force the chatbot to scour the internet by tapping the “Search” button below the prompt bar.

Effectively, today’s announcement means OpenAI is ready to take on Google’s dominance in search, though, if I had to guess, right now it’s more concerned about staying ahead of upstarts like DeepSeek. In just the last week, the company announced the availability of its latest AI model, and a new ChatGPT feature called Deep Research. Oh, and it even showed off a new logo.