Gemini vs ChatGPT: AI Apps Head-to-Head (2024)

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Verdict: When it comes to Gemini vs ChatGPT, ChatGPT is a better solution for most use cases—especially if you opt for paid plans that include access to more powerful GPT-4 capabilities.

Gemini and ChatGPT are both leading generative AI applications that provide easily accessible interfaces to chat, question, troubleshoot, and create multimodal content. Each has distinct strengths that differentiate it:

• ChatGPT: OpenAI’s established content generation and AI chatbot tool offers a range of useful features to both casual and professional users. Currently embedded in more third-party business applications, ChatGPT is easier to use across multiple channels and offers a diverse combination of established and newly developed features.
• Gemini: Google’s affordable alternative to ChatGPT generates high-quality informational and conversational content for both business and recreational users. Gemini offers more transparent and responsible AI, connects directly with the internet and Google extensions in all plans, and provides a more effective system for content quality management.

Read on to see how Gemini and ChatGPT compare in terms of price, features, ease of use and implementation, quality and relevance of outputs, and their ability to meet enterprise use cases.

Gemini vs ChatGPT Comparison at a Glance

After extensive testing, I found ChatGPT to be an all-around higher-performing tool that achieves both recreational and enterprise-level requirements with fewer errors and less clunkiness. That said, I prefer Gemini for many of my own projects for its familiar Google interface and the ability to fact-check responses with internet results. The following table shows at a glance how the two tools match up on key criteria.

What is Gemini AI?

Gemini—originally known as Google Bard—is a large language model (LLM), content generation, and AI chatbot from Google’s family of Gemini AI solutions. The free version currently runs on Gemini 1.5 Flash, while the paid version runs on Gemini 1.5 Pro, Google’s latest LLM development.

Like other LLM-based content generation and AI chatbot solutions, Gemini is designed to generate real-time responses to a variety of user queries, including several multimodal queries. What sets this tool apart is that all users, including those of free plans, can benefit from powerful real-time internet and search connectivity as well as basic extensions for popular Google tools like Maps and YouTube. Paid plans and business users can benefit from additional options, including an add-on for Google Workspace.

Gemini AI Core Features

As a frequent user, I am most impressed with Gemini’s ability to take my requests and generate creative, truly interesting content that makes sense. After years of using Google products, I appreciate how familiar the interface feels. Some core features help it stand out in a crowded field:

• Quality- and Fact-Checking Buttons: Multiple buttons for content feedback, refinement, and fact-checking let you thumbs-up or thumbs-down generated content, modify responses for length or tone, select different drafts, or fact-check against online sources.
• Internet Connectivity: Google Search provides real-time data and research capabilities for user queries, and in many cases, Gemini’s answers are supplemented with online sources, such as a relevant Wikipedia page or link.
• Google Widget Extensions: Depending on the plan, you can access Google Flights, Hotels, Maps, Workspace, YouTube, and YouTube Music widgets with a simple toggle to get refined searches related to travel, multimedia, or workplace resources.

Pros and Cons

Gemini Pricing

The cost for Gemini ranges widely, depending on when, where, and how you want to use it.

Gemini Chat:

• Free: Limited access to most features and capabilities
• Gemini Advanced: Available through a Google One premium subscription, which costs $19.99 per month after the first month; advanced features are also available in several Google Workspace products, including Gmail, Docs, and Slides

Gemini for Google Cloud, Vertex AI, and API access:

• Gemini Code Assist: $19 per user, per month, with a 12-month commitment and requirement to use on Google Cloud
• Gemini 1.0 Pro Free: Up to 15 requests and 32,000 tokens per minute, and 1,500 requests per day
• Gemini 1.0 Pro Pay-as-You-Go: $0.50 per 1 million input tokens and $1.50 per 1 million output tokens; limited to 360 requests and 120,000 tokens per minute, and 30,000 requests per day
• Gemini 1.5 Pro Free: Up to two requests and 32,000 tokens per minute, and 50 requests per day
• Gemini 1.5 Pro Pay-As-You-Go: Between $3.50 and $8 per 1 million input tokens, between $0.875 and $4.50 per 1 million tokens for context caching, and between $10.50 and $21 per 1 million output tokens; limited to 360 requests and 4 million tokens per minute, and 10,000 requests per day
• Gemini 1.5 Flash Free: Up to 15 requests and 1 million tokens per minute, and 1,500 requests per day
• Gemini 1.5 Flash Pay-As-You-Go: Between $0.35 and $0.70 per 1 million input tokens, between $0.0875 and $1 per 1 million tokens for context caching, and between $1.05 and $2.10 per 1 million output tokens; limited to 1,000 requests and 4 million tokens per minute
• Gemini on Vertex AI: Prices vary widely depending on selected model, input type, output type, and context window requirements; learn more on the Vertex AI pricing page

Gemini for Google Workspace:

• Gemini Business: $20 per user, per month, with a one-year commitment and subscription to Google Workspace
• Gemini Enterprise: $30 per user, per month, with a one-year commitment and subscription to Google Workspace

Read our original in-depth comparison between ChatGPT and Google Bard to see how the tools have changed over time.

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is a generative AI chatbot and content-creation tool that can handle multimodal inputs and outputs such as text, images, files, and code. This generative AI tool comes from OpenAI, one of the leading generative AI solutions providers on the market today, which means it integrates seamlessly with other OpenAI tools like DALL-E.

The longest-standing public tool of its kind, ChatGPT has mostly maintained its early lead—especially with recent changes to the free plan. All free plan users can now benefit from access to GPT-4o mini and GPT-4o, which are essentially lightweight versions of the flagship GPT-4. Other changes include increased emphasis on multimodality, with all plans allowing for at least some file uploads, vision capabilities, and web browsing.

ChatGPT Core Features

The ChatGPT interface is less user-friendly than that of Gemini and some other competitors, but the tool offers stability as well as extensive training and customization features. Some of the standout features include the following:

• Multimodal Content Outputs: Paid users can input with text, voice, images, or code and generate text, voice, images, or code as outputs. Free users also have limited access to some of these features, and the introduction of text-to-video generation tool Sora may add video soon.
• Coding Support: ChatGPT can handle code completion, code snippet creation, code QA tasks, and code explanations for a variety of programming situations and use cases, all from plain text and natural language prompting.
• API and Fine-Tuning Options: OpenAI offers a range of APIs and fine-tuning models that can be used to create custom versions of ChatGPT on your own applications and platforms. The latest options include GPT-4o, GPT-4o mini, GPT-3.5 Turbo, and gpt-3.5-turbo’s fine-tuning model version, but many other versions are still supported and easy to access.

Pros and Cons

Price

Pricing for ChatGPT depends on whether you use the actual ChatGPT interface or OpenAI’s GPT-based models to develop your own chat tool.

ChatGPT chat interface:

• Free: Full access to ChatGPT (GPT-3.5 version) and GPT-4o mini, as well as limited access to GPT-4.o, data analysis, file uploads, vision, browsing, and custom GPTs
• Plus: $20 per month with full access to everything included in the free plan, as well as DALL-E image generation, early access to newly-released features, and additional messaging
• Team: $25 per user, per month billed annually, or $30 per user billed monthly; includes everything in Plus as well as the ability to create and share GPTs with workspaces and colleagues, an admin console, and default exclusion of team data from model training
• Enterprise: Available upon request; includes everything in Team plus expanded context windows, custom data retention windows, increased admin controls and security features, and priority support for ongoing account management

APIs and fine-tuning models:

• GPT-4: $30 per million input tokens, $60 per million output tokens
• GPT-4o: $5 per million input tokens, $15 per million output tokens; additional costs based on how much vision capability you use
• GPT-4o Mini: $0.15 per million input tokens, $0.60 per million output tokens; additional costs based on how much vision capability you use
• GPT-3.5 Turbo: Between $0.50 and $1.50 per million input tokens, and between $1.50 and $2 per million output tokens; no vision capabilities available
• gpt-3.5-turbo Fine-tuning Model: $3 per million input tokens, $6 per million output tokens; $8 per million training tokens
• Batch API: All API and fine-tuning options listed above are available at a 50 percent discount for users willing to get return completions as late as 24 hours after submissions

Read our Midjourney vs. Dall-E review to see the best image generators for 2024.

Best for Pricing: Gemini

While it’s a close call due to their similar pricing plans and features, Gemini offers a slightly more affordable and user-friendly pricing structure, especially for small-scale API usage.

ChatGPT has the advantage of more diverse, high-tier paid plan subscriptions and better differentiation between plans, models, and APIs, but Gemini wins this category for the wider range of features it offers users at no cost—especially its APIs. While the paid, more advanced tier of Gemini can be used for free for the first month, none of the paid ChatGPT plans are accessible through free trials.

Gemini’s free plan includes Google-search-powered capabilities, access to several Google extensions, and the ability to work with image inputs and outputs. ChatGPT’s free plan recently expanded to include access to GPT-4o models and some custom GPTs as well as web browsing, vision, file uploads, and other advanced and multimodal capabilities.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that three of Gemini’s API model-access options are free for limited use cases and request quantities. For OpenAI customers, more API and fine-tuning model options are available—and several come at reasonable price points.

I also like OpenAI’s Batch API discount system, which makes their models available for half-price to users who don’t need high-speed returns. However, there are no free options or trials for OpenAI API users, which would make this less accessible for smaller teams and budgets.

Best for Core Features: ChatGPT

ChatGPT currently offers more variety and stability in its core features than Gemini. It has also made more recent improvements to its features.

Publicly available since November 2022, ChatGPT has expanded its feature set and become more reliable. Compared to Gemini and most other competitors, it offers more API and fine-tuning options, more plan tiers, high-quality multimodal options, better mobile operations and usability, higher response speeds, and more willingness to respond to a range of questions with accurate answers. For most queries, ChatGPT is also better at maintaining a conversational tone.

In contrast, Gemini offers limited API capabilities at arguably better prices, two traditional plan tiers and separate Google Workspace tiers, multimodality (including in the free plan), extensive feedback and QA features, internet and Google extension support, and the ability to answer most questions in either a conversational or professional tone.

Comparatively speaking, I’ve found Gemini sometimes less willing to answer more complex questions conversationally and slower to generate responses. However, it’s more natively connected with office suite tools and internet-based widgets that can support enriched searches, which is helpful for internet or document-based support for content generation tasks. While I prefer the layout of Gemini and its feedback mechanisms, I’ve had more consistent and accurate results from ChatGPT.

For a deeper understanding of how generative AI can support your work, see our guide to the benefits of generative AI.

Best for Ease of Use and Implementation: ChatGPT

ChatGPT has a slight edge here, but Gemini will feel more familiar if you’re accustomed to working in the Google product interface.

The regular online versions of Gemini and ChatGPT are both user-friendly. For example, I can prompt Gemini with either text or images or a combination of the two, or with voice prompts, while the free version of the ChatGPT desktop tool lets me prompt with text and file attachments via Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, or a direct computer upload. In this particular area, each tool has something the other does not.

Significantly, both Gemini and ChatGPT now let you attach and analyze a document, or—in Gemini’s case—prompt to find and analyze information based on documents found in your Google Workspace. I can either read Gemini’s responses as text or click a button for a voice reader, which is great for accessibility. While ChatGPT does not allow me to use voice prompts or listen to answers with a voice reader on my computer, the mobile app does, and ChatGPT outperforms Gemini in terms of connectivity with my most-used computer tools, including Grammarly.

Mobile Access to the AI Apps

Gemini is available in mobile apps for Android and iOS, but with a caveat—while there’s no dedicated Gemini app in the App Store for iOS users, you can download the Google app and toggle between traditional Google Search and Gemini from the home page.

On the other hand, ChatGPT has full-featured mobile apps for both Android and iOS users. Its voice capabilities work better on mobile. Users have the option to prompt with a voice and hear responses read with an AI voice reader, and users can select from different AI voice companions, all of which sound slightly more human than the default Gemini voice.

API Access to the AI Apps

Gemini has a more straightforward, singular approach to API access through the user-friendly Google AI Studio. On the other hand, ChatGPT functionality is available in more API and fine-tuning options, and OpenAI provides users with very detailed documentation to help them use these solutions effectively.

In summary, ChatGPT wins with a small margin of victory because of its third-party app connectivity and its slightly better mobile interface. However, if you’re planning to use APIs but have little experience with this type of technology, Gemini might be a better option since it’s in the highly-reputable, user-friendly Google AI Studio ecosystem.

Best for Quality and Relevance of Outputs: It Depends

For developer content and complex content requests, ChatGPT is the best. For many image and creative content requests, as well as for built-in quality assurance tools, Gemini is a better solution.

GPT-4 has made ChatGPT more accurate, consistent, human-like, and detailed. While it won’t provide offensive or problematic answers without very strategic prompting—or the occasional AI hallucination—it does seem open to responding to more queries with greater detail than Gemini, which is unwilling to answer some questions because of policy or prompting issues.

Gemini has also confidently responded to several questions with false information—and when I corrected it or rephrased my question, Gemini “thanked” me for the correction but continued to spit out the same incorrect information in follow-ups. Despite these issues, there’s something to be said for the additional built-in safeguards and feedback mechanisms.

Gemini also works well for the type of content I most often want to generate. As a writer, I want a tool that can help me creatively brainstorm for my next short story or novel. Gemini feels less mechanical and forced with the content it generates in this area, and it can generate images to supplement this content, even in the free plan. ChatGPT is better for more-technical content creation tasks, especially when it comes to coding and code explanations.

User Response to Outputs

ChatGPT includes only very basic feedback options, with a thumbs-down option for outputs. Users can provide prewritten or custom feedback to OpenAI and follow-up with a similar prompt to fine-tune results, or move on to something else.

Gemini users have more ways to express concern or modify responses that don’t work for them. Thumbs-up and thumbs-down buttons are both available, and you can provide positive or negative feedback to help the Google team improve Gemini. You can modify responses to be shorter, longer, simpler, more casual, or more professional. There’s also the option to select a different drafted response that Gemini has crafted or to report a legal issue if there are greater concerns with the content that’s been generated.

Most significantly, Gemini includes a Google Search button that lets you fact-check responses. Green highlights indicate that the response has been proven by an online source, which you can review with the dropdown button, while orange highlights indicate that no relevant online sources confirm Gemini’s output.

In sum, if you want built-in tools to review and manage content quality, Gemini is the better option here, but if you prefer a tool that is better at generating conversational content in response to nearly all user prompts, ChatGPT will perform best for your needs.

Best for Enterprise Use Cases: It Depends

ChatGPT and Gemini each have built-in features, integrations, add-ons for business users. The best enterprise solution for your business will depend on your current tool stack and preferred connectivity approach.

Gemini’s recent upgrades and additions make it ideal for Google Workspace users. A paid add-on lets businesses connect Gemini directly to their Workspace applications, including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Meet, so users can benefit from AI assistance on tasks like email composition, blog writing, competitor research, and more.

With its Google extensions, even free plan users can benefit from some business application connectivity. For example, I was not able to directly attach a PDF to a prompt because of the free plan’s limitations, but I could refer to the document in my Google Drive, and Gemini quickly identified that document and summarized it according to my instructions.

ChatGPT’s business-tier plans do not directly embed into your business applications unless you fine-tune or configure OpenAI’s APIs to your specific use case, as it is not part of a greater ecosystem of business and office suite applications. However, because of how configurable its base model is, GPT-4 and ChatGPT are already powering features in several popular business tools, including Microsoft Copilot, which is now available in Microsoft 365 office products and other tools.

Additionally, ChatGPT’s compatibility with business files in different formats has improved. Now, even free plan users can directly attach documents from their Google Drive, OneDrive, and hard drives to supplement their text-based prompts.

Generally speaking, OpenAI offers some of the best APIs and fine-tuning models for enterprise generative AI users, so if you’re looking to create a custom ChatGPT-like solution, you’ll want to work with OpenAI over all other competitors. Gemini also offers strong enterprise-ready API options, but its solutions are generally better suited to smaller businesses with fewer scalability requirements.

Who Shouldn’t Use Gemini or ChatGPT?

While Gemini and ChatGPT are both leaders in the generative AI landscape, each has its limitations that might cause prospective buyers to hesitate.

The following use cases are not the best fit for Gemini:

• Users who want a tool that integrates well with Microsoft 365 and Microsoft products
• Users who need high-powered coding and developer tools
• Users who want to work with image inputs and outputs that include humans
• Users who want to integrate with non-Google enterprise tools and applications
• Users who want to directly upload files as inputs in the free tool version

The following use cases are not the best fit for ChatGPT:

• Users who want access to free APIs and fine-tuning models
• Users who need high-powered coding and developer tools
• Users who are already invested in Google Workspace products and tools
• Users who want built-in quality management features
• Users who want to generate image outputs in the free tool version

Read our guide to generative AI enterprise use cases to understand the many ways businesses can apply this dynamic technology.

4 Best AI Alternatives to Gemini and ChatGPT

Claude

Claude is a generative AI assistant and chatbot from Anthropic designed for both business and personal use. This solution is specifically designed with ethical and responsible AI best practices in mind: Its developers have trained Claude in a way that limits its ability to generate offensive content. A free, limited version of the tool is available, as well as two paid subscription tiers and several API models. Many users select this generative AI tool not only for its ethical approach but also for its massive context windows.

Jasper

Jasper is an AI content creation and assistance tool focused on marketing and digital content creation for generative AI enterprise use cases. It can generate text and relevant business imagery, and it’s also capable of creating content based on your business’s documents and other resources. With a browser extension and a built-in feature to move Jasper content into business documents, many users select this tool because of how seamlessly it fits into their current workplace routines and workflows. Users also appreciate the tool’s copilot capabilities for knowledge base management, brand voice development, and marketing analytics and insights.

Chatsonic

Chatsonic is a generative AI solution that combines many of the features found in its competitors’ disparate tools. For example, while Chatsonic is based on large language models like GPT-4 and Claude 3 Opus, it benefits from a connection to Google that supports search-based real-time results, as well as the ability to attach PDF documents and online resources for AI-driven summaries and explanations. Chatsonic also provides users with a large library of prewritten prompts, making it an effective tool for novices or creatives who need additional support getting started. It is priced most competitively for individuals and freelancers, while its team plans can quickly get expensive.

GitHub Copilot

GitHub Copilot is a generative AI assistant that is specifically designed for coding and developer projects. It can be used to generate new code, fact-check or refine existing code, and troubleshoot coding problems with creative solutions and recommendations. Most recently, GitHub upgraded its solution with a stronger chat interface, so even less-experienced developers can develop the code they need through natural language conversations. The tool comes in three pricing tiers: Copilot Individual for $10 per month, Copilot Business for $19 per user per month, and Copilot Enterprise for $39 per user per month.

How I Evaluated Gemini vs ChatGPT

To assess Gemini and ChatGPT, I identified three key criteria for businesses and individuals needing generative AI tools. Each criteria category is weighted to reflect how important it is to the overall performance of a generative AI chatbot tool.

Content Quality and Accuracy | 40 percent

Generative AI chatbots and assistants need to generate content that can keep up with the complexities and expectations of human researchers, generating consistent and accurate content for users. For this criteria, I specifically looked at the frequency of accurate responses, the accuracy of responses for more complex prompts (including mathematical reasoning and creative content generation), the depth of responses, alignment with initial prompts, and how closely generated content resembled human-like quality and tone. I also considered what features, such as fact-checking buttons and feedback mechanisms, were available to manage quality and accuracy directly within each tool.

Ease of Use and Accessibility | 30 percent

Generative AI tools, especially ones like Gemini and ChatGPT that are available to the public, should be intuitive to set up and easy to use. To assess these tools on their user-friendliness and accessibility, I considered how well each tool handled my natural language prompts, the different modes of installation that are available, continuity across multichannel conversations, mobile usability, customer support, self-service resources, and affordability.

Creativity and Range | 30 percent

As the generative AI landscape’s creative tools and capabilities continue to grow, I decided it would be important to assess both of these tools on the range of features that they currently provide to users. I looked at how well they handled multimodal inputs and outputs, how responses aligned with diverse enterprise use cases, APIs and fine-tuning options, and third-party integrations and connectivity. I placed special emphasis on multimodal availability and quality across plan tiers.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is a multimodal generative AI chatbot that was developed by and is now owned and operated by OpenAI. It was first released to the public in November 2022 and has since developed into one of the best and most widely-recognized generative AI tools for general and professional use.

What is Google Gemini?

Google Gemini is a multimodal generative AI chatbot that Google developed and runs. Though similar to Google’s earlier generative AI model, Bard, Gemini has greatly expanded generative AI capabilities that compete directly with top solutions like ChatGPT. Gemini is not only the name of Google’s AI chatbot but also the name of its latest family of generative AI models.

Is Gemini better than GPT-4?

Gemini is better than GPT-4 for certain use cases and user types, but many users still prefer ChatGPT and GPT-4. Generally speaking, Gemini is better for users who want support for conversational and creative tasks and for users who want easy access to the internet or support for Google Workspace products. In contrast, ChatGPT is better for custom enterprise solutions and more complex content generation queries, including those related to code generation and code quality management.

Is Gemini better than Bard?

Yes, Gemini is better than Bard, in that Gemini is essentially the replacement for Bard. Bard was developed back in early 2023, when it was built on LaMDA and then PaLM Google AI models. The product was revamped and rebranded as Gemini starting in late 2023, when its capabilities were enhanced and the product was newly established on Gemini foundation models.

Is Gemini free?

The lowest tier of Gemini is free and available to anyone with a Google account. However, the more advanced version of the app, as well as most APIs and customizable features, are available only with subscription fees.

Is ChatGPT free?

The lowest tier of ChatGPT is free and available to anyone; users do not even need to have an OpenAI account to access the most basic ChatGPT features and capabilities. However, more advanced features and customizable models are only available through paid subscriptions; no API or fine-tuning models are available for free.

Bottom Line: Gemini vs ChatGPT

While Gemini and ChatGPT are both leading generative AI solutions, ChatGPT is the more mature and advanced of the two tools, especially when you consider the stability and speed with which it responds to user requests. It is, by and large, the most consistent and scalable tool in this space. Gemini is a little bit more finicky, but it’s a worthy adversary that is already beating ChatGPT in a few key areas related to user experience and multimodality.

As both of these tools offer free plans, I recommend doing some hands-on testing with both tools to determine which one is best for you. In the process of developing this analysis over the course of several months, I’ve used both tools and have gotten creative with my prompts, adjusting tone, the length and detail of my queries, and the content formats I submit to see how outcomes differ. Ultimately, to find the best solution for you or your team, you must experiment with both Gemini and ChatGPT on desktop and mobile interfaces, comparing how well they handle your prompts and how effective each tool is at reworking its responses when necessary.

To learn about the larger landscape of leading AI software, read our guide to the best artificial intelligence software for 2024.