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Which AI Assistant Should I Use? A 60-Second Quiz

Answer eight quick questions about how you actually live, and this free quiz says which AI assistant suits you: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot or Perplexity.

Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you type is uploaded or stored, and there's no account to create.

DRAFT — not indexed. Fill every OWNER marker, then set `draft: false`.

  1. 1. What would you use it for most?

    Pick the one you can imagine doing this week, not the most impressive one.

  2. 2. What do you use most of the day?
  3. 3. Which of these do you already pay for, if any?

    Some assistants come bundled with a subscription you may already have.

  4. 4. How do you feel about paying for one?
  5. 5. What do you want an answer to look like?
  6. 6. How much does it matter to you what happens to what you type?

    Every one of these keeps your conversations. They differ in how clearly they say so and how easily you can turn training off.

  7. 7. Will you talk to it, or type?
  8. 8. Who else in the house will use it?

8 questions. Nothing you pick is saved or sent anywhere.

The five, side by side

ChatGPTby OpenAI

The safe default. It does most things well and everyone you ask for help will know it.

Free tier:
Free account, with limits on the newest model
Paid tier:
About $20 a month for the plus plan

What it is good at

  • Handles writing, planning, photos and voice in one app
  • The most tutorials, videos and friends who can help when you get stuck
  • Good phone apps on both iPhone and Android

Worth knowing: It sounds confident even when it is wrong, and it does not always show you where an answer came from.

Geminiby Google

The one that is already in your pocket if you live in Gmail, Docs and Android.

Free tier:
Free with any Google account
Paid tier:
Bundled with a paid Google One storage plan

What it is good at

  • Built into Android, Gmail, Docs and Search, so there is nothing new to install
  • Strong with photos — point your phone at something and ask what it is
  • If you already pay Google for storage, the paid tier may come with it

Worth knowing: The experience differs a lot depending on whether you are in the app, in Search, or inside Gmail, which is confusing at first.

Claudeby Anthropic

The careful writer. Best when the words matter and you would rather be told 'I am not sure'.

Free tier:
Free account, with a daily message limit
Paid tier:
About $20 a month for the pro plan

What it is good at

  • Writing that needs tone and judgement — a difficult email, a complaint letter, a eulogy
  • Long documents: paste in a contract or a report and ask questions about it
  • More willing to say when it does not know something

Worth knowing: No image generation, and the free tier runs out faster than the others on a busy day.

Copilotby Microsoft

The Office one. Worth it mainly if Word, Excel and Outlook are where your day happens.

Free tier:
Free with a Microsoft account
Paid tier:
Bundled with some Microsoft 365 subscriptions

What it is good at

  • Sits inside Word, Excel, Outlook and Windows itself
  • Good for turning a messy spreadsheet into something readable
  • If your household already pays for Microsoft 365, you may already have it

Worth knowing: Outside the Office apps it is the least distinctive of the five, and what you get varies by subscription.

Perplexityby Perplexity AI

The research one. It answers with links, so you can check it rather than trust it.

Free tier:
Free, no account needed to start
Paid tier:
About $20 a month for the pro plan

What it is good at

  • Every answer comes with sources you can click and read yourself
  • Best of the five for shopping research, comparisons and current facts
  • Works without an account, so it is the easiest one to try once

Worth knowing: It is built for looking things up, not for long writing or brainstorming, and it is the least known of the five.

Prices, free tiers and app availability last checked: . AI apps change their prices often — confirm on the company's own site before you pay.

How the quiz decides

There is no scoreboard behind this. Each answer leans a little towards the assistants it genuinely suits — picking Android leans towards Gemini because it is already on the phone in your hand, picking links I can check leans towards Perplexity because showing its sources is the whole point of it. Add up eight answers and one usually pulls ahead.

The result tells you which of your answers did the pulling, so you can disagree with it. If the reason it gives you is one you do not care much about, look at the runner-up instead — that is what it is there for.

Why there is no single winner

Ask the internet which AI assistant is best and you get benchmark charts comparing scores on exams none of us will ever sit. For everyday use — a difficult email, a broken dishwasher, a week of dinners, a homework question at half past eight — the gap between these five is much smaller than the gap between asking them well and asking them badly.

What actually differs is the shape of them. One is already inside your email. One shows its sources. One is careful about saying when it does not know. One lives in Word and Excel. Those differences matter far more to a normal week than a percentage point on a reasoning test.

What to do with your answer

Take the winner and use it for a week on something real, not a test question. Then take the runner-up and do the same. The one you reach for on the second Tuesday without deciding to is your answer, and it may not be the one the quiz picked — the quiz is a shortcut past the first week, not a verdict on your behalf.

Common questions

Is there one best AI assistant?
No, and anyone who tells you there is has something to sell. They are close enough in quality now that the thing which decides it for a normal household is fit: which phone you carry, what you already pay for, whether you want links you can check, and whether you will talk to it or type. That is what the quiz asks about.
Do I have to pay for any of these?
No. All five have a free tier you can use without handing over a card, and for most people the free tier is genuinely enough. The paid tiers — around $20 a month each — mostly buy you higher limits and earlier access to new models, not a different kind of help.
Can I use more than one?
Yes, and plenty of people end up doing exactly that: one for looking things up, another for writing. They are all free to start, so there is no cost to keeping two. If that sounds like clutter, take the top two from your result, use each for a week, and keep the one you open without thinking about it.
Is anything I type into this quiz saved?
No. The quiz is scored in your browser — there is no server here to send anything to, no account, and no cookie recording your answers. Reload the page and it is blank again. What you type into an assistant afterwards is a separate matter, governed by that company's privacy policy.
How often are the prices and details checked?
Every detail about the five assistants lives in one file with a visible last-checked date, shown under the write-ups. AI companies change prices and move features between tiers often, so treat the numbers as a guide and confirm on the company's own site before you pay for anything.