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ChatGPT, an artificially intelligent chatbot developed by OpenAI and based on GPT-3.5, made a roaring appearance and swept the internet by storm. It has the potential—indeed, the capability—to transform the landscape of the cybersphere. It can create content of all kinds, write and debug codes, and even act as a companion chef, among other things. But it is prone to error, to fabrication—or “hallucination”, to use AI jargon.
That’s about to change, perhaps not dramatically but significantly. OpenAI released the newest iteration of ChatGPT, built on GPT-4. It’s more mature, smarter, and less repetitive and verbose—like it is with humans: the more knowledgeable and wise you are, the less words you need to convey an idea.
So, how can we access GPT-4? That’s what you’ll find out in this article. But first.
What is GPT-4?
GPT-4 is the successor to GPT-3.5, the large language model behind ChatGPT. GPT-4 is more reliable and creative, and can handle much more nuanced instructions than GPT-3.5. Unlike its predecessor, it can accept images as inputs besides text. And it can handle much more words of text, enhancing its ability to generate long-form content and analyse lengthy text—25,000 words, whereas the previous model could handle 3000 words (both are approximation).
It cannot however generate images from text inputs. If you want to generate images from text prompts, click this guide on how to generate images from WhatsApp by integrating ChatGPT and DALL-E with WhatsApp.
GPT-4 can solve difficult problems with greater accuracy, thanks to its broader general knowledge and problem-solving abilities. GPT-4 significantly reduces hallucination and is factually more reliable than GPT-3.5.
How do we get access to GPT-4, anyway?
How can I access GPT-4?
GPT-4 is not yet widely accessible; only a privileged few can get access to GPT-4, for now at least. It can be accessed in two different ways plus one.
The first is to subscribe to ChatGPT Plus. Those who have ChatGPT Plus can get their hands on it; but the usage limit is capped. ChatGPT Plus subscribers can get access to GPT-4 on chat.openai.com. They get up to 100 messages every four hours.
The second way to get access to GPT-4 is with OpenAI API. Unfortunately, this way is also not directly accessible. You’ll need to join the GPT-4 API waitlist by filling a form and citing your use cases. And you may have to wait for some time (who knows how long?) due to high volume of applications.
There’s however another less restrictive way to access GPT-4. It is to use the Microsoft Bing chatbot. Microsoft implemented the GPT-4 into its Bing chatbot even before OpenAI publicly announced the release of GPT-4. And the good news is that you don’t even need to join a waitlist to use the new chatbot powered by GPT-4. If you want to get access to GPT-4 for free, then this is the way.
To get access to GPT-4 for free with Bing, go to bing.com and sign in (or create an account, if you don’t already have one) with your Microsoft account.
Once you’re signed in, you should be able to access GPT-4 with Bing immediately. Click the chat button underneath the search bar or the Chat option at the top right corner to start chatting with the Bing chatbot.
Microsoft lets you access GPT-4 for free via its Bing chatbot but it, too, is severely constrained. You can only have 15 queries in a single session—and not more. And it hasn’t the multimodal capabilities yet, ie, you can interact with it only with text.
How to get access to GPT-4
If you’re not one of the privileged users with a ChatGPT Plus subscription and are not interested in the API and don’t want to use the Bing chatbot (for whatever reason), then the following instructions will walk you through how to get access to GPT-4.
Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to get access to GPT-4.
Step 1: Create an OpenAI account
Create an account on OpenAI. With this account, you’ll be able to access ChatGPT as well as DALL-E and gives you access to the API. Then log in to ChatGPT.
Step 2: Upgrade to ChatGPT Plus
Once you’re in the chat, click the “Upgrade to Plus” option on the left panel.
Step 3: Select the plan
You’ll be shown a comparison of the free plan with the plus plan. Access to GPT-4 is not explicitly mentioned in the benefits. It comes under “Priority access to new features”. Click the “Upgrade plan” button.
Step 4: Set up the payment method
Enter your card details and select the billing address. Then click the “Subscribe” button to proceed with the payment.
Once you’ve completed the payment process, you’ll get access to GPT-4 via the chatbot, ie, ChatGPT.
To access GPT-4, select GPT-4 from the “Model” dropdown menu and start chatting.
And so that is how we access GPT-4.
What if you cannot get access to GPT-4?
If, however, the Plus version is not available in your region or if you don’t want to upgrade, then you can continue with ChatGPT. It is great for most use cases. OpenAI themselves said that in a casual conversation, the “distinction between GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 can be subtle.” The difference begins to matter only when the task reaches a certain level of complexity.
And, in any case, OpenAI will make GPT-4 available to regular users—soon, one would hope.
Should you upgrade to Plus to access GPT-4
Whether or not you need to upgrade to the Plus plan in order to get access to GPT-4 depends on your use cases and how keen you are to get your hands on the newly touted capabilities.
If you cannot think of any specific use case and if you don’t find ChatGPT (with GPT-3.5) severely limiting, then you might do well to sit out and wait. Most of the capabilities of GPT-4 have yet to be rolled out as features—eg, the visual and audio inputs, which will have casual uses. Moreover, the usage of the empowered ChatGPT is capped dynamically depending on demand; and in normal times limited to 100 messages every four hours.
You can also try Bing Chat and compare the results with ChatGPT’s. This can give you a cursory idea of what you’d get with GPT-4 should you upgrade.
GPT-4 or not, you can do plenty of cool and useful things with ChatGPT. Visit our blog and discover all the various things you can use ChatGPT for.
Or start with one of these articles:
- How to Write Effective Emails with ChatGPT: Tips and Tricks
- How to Use ChatGPT for Digital Marketing
- How to Use ChatGPT to Master Excel and Google Sheets
- 15 Ways to Use ChatGPT for Business: Harnessing the Power of ChatGPT to Scale Your Business
