ChatGPT Guide: How to Use the AI for Free

Artificial intelligence (AI) is now on everyone’s lips and since OpenAI launched its chatbot at the end of November 2022 under the name ChatGPT, interest in it has grown considerably. Many online media outlets have reported on it and it has also been discussed extensively on social networks.

ChatGPT can answer questions and create texts based on entered instructions. The chatbot can also add to or rewrite texts. It remembers the existing chat history and can respond to it or ask questions about the user’s input. ChatGPT understands different languages, so you can chat in English or German, for example. In this ChatGPT guide, I will show you exactly how to register with OpenAI and use ChatGPT free of charge.

What is ChatGPT from OpenAI and what can you do with the AI?

ChatGPT is an AI chatbot that was developed by the company OpenAI and was first published at the end of November 2022. ChatGPT uses artificial intelligence (AI for short) internally. This makes it possible to analyze and understand the human language of an input and then generate an output in response, which in turn is very similar to human language and contains appropriate information for the request.

The free version of ChatGPT currently uses the GPT 3.5 language model from OpenAI (GPT stands for Generative Pre-trained Transformer). This is based on deep learning technology. Algorithms from several networks and different sources are trained with huge amounts of data. As ChatGPT’s database is based on a large number of texts, books and internet sources, it can provide pretty good answers on many topics.

What can OpenAI’s ChatGPT AI be used for?

ChatGPT can be used for a wide variety of things. It can be used to display information on a specific topic. The chatbot can also create the source code for a program or, for example, write instructions on a given topic. The time saved is an enormous factor.

The AI chat is also very well suited for text creation, writing tasks and as an assistant for content production. For example, you can use ChatGPT to help you create blog articles. You can also have texts for emails, newsletters or social media posts generated automatically.

The AI is a good assistant when it comes to finding ideas. ChatGPT can also be used very well as a kind of virtual assistant. You can simply ask it about any conceivable topic and usually get an amazingly good and helpful answer.

How to create an account to use ChatGPT for free

To be able to use ChatGPT, you must first create an account with OpenAI. To do this, go to the ChatGPT login page.

Click on the “Sign up” button on the right.

You can now create an OpenAI account by logging in with an e-mail address or a Microsoft account, Google account or Apple account.

If you have used an e-mail address, you must then assign a password for your new account. You will then receive an e-mail with a verification button that you must click to confirm the e-mail address.

In the next step, enter your first and last name and your date of birth.

You will then be asked to enter a telephone number for verification. Enter your mobile phone number here, to which a confirmation code will be sent by SMS.

Then enter this 6-digit code from the SMS in the input field that appears.

This completes the creation of your ChatGPT account and you will be redirected to the ChatGPT user interface.

There you can enter your questions in the input field at the bottom. The answer will then be displayed above it. You can create a new chat using the “New Chat” button at the top left.

As a simple example, I once asked ChatGPT for the height of the Eiffel Tower. The answer came quickly and looks like this:

Use ChatGPT in other languages

ChatGPT understands a whole range of different languages, including English, German, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch, Russian and Chinese. To use ChatGPT in German, for example, you do not need to make any settings.

You can simply ask the AI questions in German and you will then receive an answer in German. If this does not work straight away, you can also explicitly state in the question that the answer should be in German.

A ChatGPT Guide: Making the Most of Text AI

After logging in to ChatGPT, you can actually get to grips with the application quite quickly and can enter your first questions in the search bar and have a conversation with the chatbot. At some point, however, you start to wonder how to organize your prompts if you have one of the often somewhat more complicated use cases that AI tools can master.

Use the ChatGPT Artificial Intelligence Free of Charge

In the free version, you can achieve significantly better results with ChatGPT if you know a few tips and tricks that have been tried and tested to simply get more out of ChatGPT:

1. It makes sense to focus on a single issue at a time. To do this, you then make a separate request for each individual aspect instead of formulating everything in a joint request.
2. Certain items can be excluded from a query in order to narrow down the result better. For example, if you are looking for recipes, you could add the following to the question: “Exclude recipes that are vegetarian or take longer than an hour.”
3. In some situations, it is helpful to assign a specific role to ChatGPT. This could be, for example: “Act like an SEO expert who explains the available technical terms to his audience.”
4. It can also be useful to tell the AI the intended audience. This could be, for example: “Write the answer so that it is intended for an audience of business people.”
5. Since ChatGPT has been trained with significantly more English text than German, in some cases it may make sense to make a request in English and then translate the answer into German using a translator such as Deepl.
6. The queries or input prompts can be edited afterwards. So if you are not 100% satisfied with the answer right away, you can change your question again and make it more precise in order to get a better answer. There is a small edit icon to the right of the question.

The Paid Version ChatGPT Plus

The Plus version of the AI tool was launched at the beginning of 2023. It can also be used online, which means that ChatGPT can also access information from the internet at runtime to answer questions. ChatGPT Plus is based on GPT 4 and is faster than the free version.

ChatGPT Plus guarantees that the service is available at high utilization rates. It also copes much better with more complex instructions. You can also use plugins with the Plus version, which offer helpful additional functions.

The cost for ChatGPT Plus is currently 20$ per month.

Use Chat GPT on Mobile Devices

You can also use ChatGPT on your smartphone and enjoy the benefits of quick answers to questions on the go. There are two ways to do this. Either simply use the browser on your smartphone and call up ChatGPT as you would on your PC.

The other option is to use an app that is available for Android and iOS.

Using ChatGPT on Android

If you want to use ChatGPT as an app on your smartphone with an Android operating system, you can download and install the ChatGPT app from the Google Play Store.

To use the app, you must create an account with OpenAI, as described above. If you already have an account, you can simply use it to log in to the app.

Using ChatGPT on iOS

There is also a ChatGPT app for Apple’s iOS operating system that you can use on your iPhone. To do this, install the ChatGPT app in the App Store.

You can also use an existing OpenAI account to log in to the app. If you do not yet have an account, create one as described above.

FAQ

Which Language Models Is ChatGPT Based On?

ChatGPT is based on the GPT 3.5 language model, which in turn uses the following language models internally:

• code-davinci-002
• text-davinci-002
• text-davinci-003
• gpt-3.5-turbo-0301

Further information can be found in the OpenAI documentation.

Will ChatGPT Be Offered Permanently Free of Charge?

It is unclear how long ChatGPT will be offered free of charge. Currently, the version with GPT 3.5 can be used free of charge. In addition, ChatGPT Plus and ChatGPT Enterprise are available for a fee, which are based on the newer GPT 4 language model, provide faster responses and promise availability even under high utilization.

Is It Possible to Download ChatGPT and Use It as an App?

Yes, you can download a desktop app on Github for Windows, Mac and Linux and install it locally.

You can find the Android app ChatGPT in the Google Play Store and the iOS app ChatGPT in the App Store.

Do You Have to Be Able to Program to Use ChatGPT?

No, you don’t need to be able to program to use ChatGPT. The aim is to ensure that the artificial intelligence can be used by as many people as possible. You can simply enter your questions or instructions in normal language in the input field and receive a suitable answer.

Are Chatgpt’s Answers Always Correct?

No, the answers are not always correct. You should therefore always check the answers yourself. For one thing, the data used to train ChatGPT only goes up to 2021 (for GPT-3). Therefore, some knowledge is simply already out of date or other knowledge is not available.

The AI is also unable to decide for itself whether certain information is correct or incorrect. For example, if the underlying data already contains errors, ChatGPT will reproduce them.

ChatGPT’s knowledge is limited to the data with which it was trained. With GPT 3.5, it is also not possible to retrieve data from the Internet in order to take it into account for the answers. However, this is possible with the newer GPT-4 in the fee-based ChatGPT Plus.