Summary
- No single AI chatbot can do everything, so using a combination is more effective.
- Choose AI chatbots based on specific tasks: Claude for analysis, Gemini or Perplexity for control.
- Mixing free AI tools strategically can enhance productivity without the need to pay for all features.
The hunt for the perfect AI assistant is over—because there isn’t one! While ChatGPT excels at general-purpose tasks, Claude is much better at document analysis, and Perplexity shines at web search. As such, it’s wiser to use multiple chatbots than to stick with just one.
There’s No “One AI To Rule Them All”
The big promise of AI is that it’ll help us automate parts of our lives and make us more productive. I know many people searching for that one AI that’ll do everything for them and make their lives easier.
Unfortunately, such a technology doesn’t exist—at least, not yet! I have been neck-deep in the AI trenches since ChatGPT was released back in November 2022, and I’m yet to find a single chatbot that can do everything I need it to.
That said, there are plenty of powerful AI tools that are exceptional at a few specific tasks. This means you can mix and match a few of these tools to build an AI chatbot stack—a collection of AI tools—to achieve the much-desired productivity gains.
Before you worry about the cost of running multiple AI systems, I just want to highlight that you don’t need to pay for all of them—or potentially any of them. The free tiers often provide more than enough functionality for most users. You can just pay for the chatbots that you use the most if you want higher usage limits or when you’re seeking paid features.
My AI Chatbot Stack and How I Use Them
Here’s a quick overview of how I use different AI chatbots in my daily workflow. This should help get your creative juices flowing and give you some idea of what AI chatbots to use, depending on your needs and requirements.
For Controlling my Phone and iPad
I currently use Gemini Assistant to control my Pixel 6a (my primary phone) and Siri with my iPad. While Google Assistant and the old Siri could handle basic commands, these new AI-powered versions understand natural language much better. I can speak normally instead of using specific command phrases—which makes the whole experience feel more natural and less robotic.
Now, as you most likely know, Siri is the one and only AI assistant for Apple devices to control the device. However, for Android, you have two solid options right now—Google Gemini and Perplexity Assistant. Both of these offer deep integration with your device and can help you set alarms, turn on or off the flashlight, play music, and more.
The only reason I use Gemini over Perplexity is purely because I started paying for Gemini Advanced. That said, I did test Perplexity Assistant, and it’s shockingly good and can do most tasks Gemini assistant can.
For Voice Chats
I am one of those people who loves to think out loud—literally—and voice-based AI chatbots are the best thing to come out lately. ChatGPT was the first to market this tech, and it’s very good, but I must admit that I prefer Gemini Live.
Now, credit where credit’s due, ChatGPT’s advanced voice is smarter and more human-like compared to Gemini Live. But advanced voice is only available to paid users—with free users getting a one-month preview. Furthermore, ChatGPT standard voice is very slow and not fun to use. In comparison, Gemini Live gives you real-time human-like voice chats for free. Yes, the responses aren’t as smart as ChatGPT, but it isn’t too bad for my use case.
I use voice chat as a sounding board. I am not expecting that Gemini (nor ChatGPT) will say something revolutionary or hand me the missing piece of the puzzle—they rarely can. But having someone (something) to talk with in real time and bounce ideas off of makes the brainstorming sessions much more productive. It’s like having a Sherlock Skull to help you think things through.
As a Personal Assistant
I used ChatGPT as my personal digital assistant but, as of late, I have shifted to Gemini. The main feature you want from a personal digital assistant is that it should be able to remember stuff you tell it.
All chatbots are programmed to forget everything you tell them when you start a new chat. So you need to have a system that stores information like your preferences or current projects between your chat sessions.
ChatGPT used to be the only AI chatbot that had the Memory feature which allowed this functionality. But recently, Google Gemini has introduced the Saved Info functionality, which also lets you save your information to the chatbot so it can reference it in future discussions.
For Analyzing Long Documents
When I need to analyze lengthy documents, I look for an AI chatbot that has a long context window—the amount of text an AI can process at once. Now, the two AI chatbots with the longest context window currently available are Google’s Gemini (paid plans) with 1 million tokens (roughly 700,000 words) and Claude with 200,000-tokens (roughly 150,000 words).
Looking at the numbers, Gemini should be the winner, but I prefer Claude more, because it’s much smarter. This means I get much smarter responses from Claude compared to Gemini. Furthermore, 200,000 tokens is no joke, and rarely have I needed more than that when analyzing any documents in my workflow.
I specifically avoid ChatGPT when analyzing long documents. It has a significantly smaller context window and uses RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) to analyze documents—which I’ve found can be inaccurate and prone to hallucinations. There’s nothing more frustrating than getting confident-sounding incorrect information when you’re doing serious research.
For Web Research
AI chatbots can be a huge help to streamline research work—from sourcing information to summarizing it. While I wouldn’t rely on any AI chatbot to come to a conclusion on my behalf, I do use them to gather and summarize research papers, so I know which ones are most relevant to me.
I prefer Gemini for this use case, but Perplexity is also a viable option. With Gemini Advanced (the paid version), you get access to Deep Research—a feature that creates a research plan, scours the web to find relevant sources, and then summarizes them into a document for you to read.
With Gemini Deep Research, you can expect the AI chatbot to reference more than 50 sources to generate a full report for you. In comparison, Perplexity has a Pro Search feature that references around 10-30 online sources to come up with answers.
At the time of writing, free users get 3 Pro Searches per day, while paid subscribers enjoy 300 Pro Searches per day for all their research needs.
The future might bring us an all-in-one AI that excels at everything, but until then, I’ll keep using multiple chatbots to get the best results. Each tool has its strengths, and using them strategically can significantly boost your productivity. The key is understanding what each tool does best and incorporating it into your workflow where it makes the most sense.
