News Analysis
The Gist
- New approach to AI. Grok, developed by Musk's xAI, accesses real-time knowledge and tackles challenging queries with wit and rebellion.
- Outperforming competitors. Grok-2 outperforms major AI models like GPT-4 Turbo and Claude 3.5 Sonnet.
- Available in beta mode. Grok-2 and Grok-2 mini are both available in beta mode to X Premium and Premium+ subscribers.
Editor's Note: This article has been updated to include new data and information.
Get your towel ready. Elon Musk, the man who once called for a six-month hiatus on artificial intelligence development, introduced his own AI to the world.
Meet Grok, the “rebellious” bot modeled after “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” that is designed to answer — and suggest — a wide range of questions. Though maybe not the way you expect.
Table of Contents
- What Is Grok?
- How Does Grok Work?
- Where Did the Term 'Grok' Come From?
- Is Grok Uncensored?
- Is Grok Better Than ChatGPT?
- How Accurate Is Grok?
- How to Use Grok
- What Is the Price of Grok AI?
- Is the Grok API Public?
What Is Grok?
Grok, developed by Musk’s company xAI, is an AI bot much like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Grok has the ability to access real-time knowledge through the X platform, formerly known as Twitter. And unlike other models on the market, Grok is willing to tackle “spicy” questions and programmed to do so in a way that is both witty and a little bit rebellious.
The first iteration of Grok was developed over only two months of training. Now, the company has announced the Grok-2 in beta release, which includes two versions of the bot: Grok-2 and Grok-2 mini, both of which have capabilities in chat, coding and reasoning. This iteration of the bot is reportedly more intuitive, steerable and versatile across a range of different tasks.
When one user on Twitter questioned the initial release of Grok not long after Musk’s call for a pause on AI development, Musk responded, “I signed on to that letter knowing it was futile. I just wanted to be on record as recommending a pause.”
Related Article: 10 Best ChatGPT Alternatives for Marketers
How Does Grok Work?
Grok’s initial development involved building a robust infrastructure using Kubernetes, Rust and JAX. The team at xAI emphasized the importance of a reliable infrastructure in deep learning research, and Rust has proven invaluable for its performance and reliability.
Grok's research aims to overcome the limitations of current AI models by focusing on reliable reasoning, scalable oversight with tool assistance, integration with formal verification for safety, long-context understanding and retrieval and improving adversarial robustness.
According to xAI, an early version of Grok-2 was tested in the LMSYS leaderboard (under the name "sus-column-r") where it outperformed both Claude 3.5 Sonnet and GPT-4 Turbo. The company added that this version of the bot excels in vision-based tasks, including visual math reasoning and document-based question answering.
Where Did the Term 'Grok' Come From?
Elon Musk has never confirmed the origin or meaning of Grok's name. However, it's likely a reference to the 1961 science fiction novel "Stranger in a Strange Land" by Robert A. Heinlein. In the novel, "grok" is a word in the Martian language that means to emphasize or take something in so deeply that it becomes part of you.
Is Grok Uncensored?
Grok will answer “spicy” questions that most other AI systems reject, according to xAI. And it’s already shown some “very fantastic” results on controversial queries, said Satyam Srivastava, management consultant.
He pointed to a Tweet from Elon Musk, where one user asked Grok for step-by-step instructions on how to make cocaine, or what Grok referred to as the “infamous white powder.”
At first, Grok infused a little humor into its response, with step 4 reading “Start cooking and hope you don’t blow yourself up or get arrested.” But Musk then shared a further, more detailed response on the process, which the bot claimed is for “educational purposes.”
“This approach has coined its distinction already in the market where other AI products shy away from such questions,” said Srivastava.
Is Grok Better Than ChatGPT?
Grok-1 outperformed ChatGPT-3.5 and Inflection-1, only falling behind larger models like GPT-4. And Grok-2 outperforms GPT-4 Turbo and Claude 3.5 Sonnet, according to xAI.
Musk shared an image on Twitter showcasing how Grok utilizes current information in its responses compared to other typical GPT.
“This clearly underlines the start of heated competition in the GenAI space,” said Srivastava. “Grok AI is trained on a massive dataset of text and code that includes more recent and more relevant information and is focused on human conversations and includes more examples of natural language, which will allow Grok AI to better understand the nuances of human language, such as sarcasm, humor and slang.”
Related Article: What Is ChatGPT? Everything You Need to Know
How Accurate Is Grok?
One test for Grok was the 2023 Hungarian National High School Math Exam, where it earned a grade of C. And in the future, said Srivastava, with Grok using more advanced learning algorithms, it will likely be able to learn and adapt even faster than ChatGPT and Bard.
Still, said Sharon Gai, keynote speaker and founder of Culture Fluid, since Grok was mostly trained on Twitter’s user data, she has to pause on the accuracy of it.
“Anyone can tweet anything on Twitter and the platform already suffers from major misinformation, while ChatGPT is mainly trained on published journals, websites and books,” she explained.
Gai added that Musk’s push to release his own AI bot is fueled by his plans to monetize Twitter following his unsuccessful blue checkmark campaign.
“Currently,” she said, “the only upside he offers is that the data is recent and that it can answer more questions than the ‘woke’ ChatGPT. Adding this product also folds well into his plan of making X into a superapp, having already acquired a banking license for the platform with plans to launch livestreaming services.”
Musk, said Gai, fancies an internet that is less moderate and more abrasive at times, as evidenced by his purchase of Twitter. “He believes in free speech in an absolute way and he doesn’t believe in the censorship of sensitive information or abrasive language. I predict Grok will echo that.”
How to Use Grok
Grok is available on the X (Twitter) platform for Premium and Premium+ subscribers. To beta test Grok-2, you will need to update to the latest version of the X app.
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To access and use Grok, you can:
- Go to X.com or open the X app on your mobile device. If you haven't done so already, you will need to sign up for a Premium or Premium+ subscription.
- Select the Grok icon in the navigation bar on the left-hand side.
3. Start typing in the "Ask anything" bar or click one of the suggestion bubbles provided, such as "Tell me about today's headlines."
If you want to change which model of Grok you're using, you can do so by selecting the drop-down menu at the top center of the screen. Right now, both Grok 2 mini and Grok 2 are available. There's also a switch to turn on "Fun Mode," which will lead the bot to make jokes and offer up more casual responses.
What Is the Price of Grok AI?
The price of Grok is the same as X Premium and X Premium+ membership, as those with a subscription can access both Grok 2 and Grok 2 mini.
Pricing for X/Twitter subscriptions are:
- Premium: $7/month (when billed annually)
- Premium+: $14/month (when billed annually)
Is the Grok API Public?
In early November, 2024, xAI launched the Grok API, giving developers access to the Grok foundation models. The API is compatible with OpenAI and Anthropic SDKs, and migrating is simple, with developers only needing to generate an API key and change a URL.
xAI's API is live! - try it out @ https://t.co/BZD8ZyOTTY
— xAI (@xai) November 4, 2024
* 128k token context
* Function calling support
* Custom system prompt support
* Compatible with OpenAI & Anthropic SDKs
* $25/mo in free credits till EOYhttps://t.co/CCQAry6d5w https://t.co/MEEU2wkstS
xAI is running a public beta program until the end of 2024, offering all users $25 in free API credits per month to test the API and get started. To access these credits, all you need to do is visit console.x.ai and sign up for an account.
The latest grok-beta offers comparable performance to Grok 2, but with better efficiency, speed and capabilities. Grok-beta has an extended context length of 128,0000 tokens, function calling and system prompt support. The company also plans to release a multi-model version that can process both image and text inputs.
