How to use HuggingChat: ChatGPT alternative

Hugging Face, a well-funded AI startup, has developed and released HuggingChat, an open-source chatbot that is being touted as an alternative to OpenAI’s popular ChatGPT. Users can test HuggingChat via a web interface or integrate it with other apps and services using Hugging Face's API. The AI-powered chatbot is capable of performing tasks similar to those handled by ChatGPT, such as writing code, composing emails, and even generating rap lyrics.

The driving force behind HuggingChat is an AI model developed by Open Assistant, a project spearheaded by LAION, a German non-profit that also created the dataset used to train Stable Diffusion, a text-to-image AI model. While Open Assistant's primary objective is to emulate ChatGPT, the group, which is mostly comprised of volunteers, has much larger aspirations beyond that.

How to use HuggingChat?

If you're interested in trying out HuggingChat, the good news is that it's entirely free to use. Even better, you don't even need an account to get started. Here's how you can use this exciting new chatbot technology:

1. First, navigate to the Hugging Face website, where you'll find a link to the HuggingChat interface.
2. Once you've arrived at the HuggingChat page, you'll see a dialogue box where you can enter your prompt. Simply type in your query or request where it says "Ask anything".
3. Once you've entered your prompt, hit enter and wait for HuggingChat to generate a response. Depending on the complexity of your request, the chatbot may take a few moments to provide a reply.

Is HuggingChat a good ChatGPT alternative?

“We want to build the assistant of the future, able to not only write email and cover letters, but do meaningful work, use APIs, dynamically research information and much more, with the ability to be personalized and extended by anyone. And we want to do this in a way that is open and accessible, which means we must not only build a great assistant, but also make it small and efficient enough to run on consumer hardware,” Open Assistant states on its GitHub page.

Let’s try it

To compose an ending for my article, I visited HuggingChat, submitted my article, and requested the tool to generate a conclusion for me:

• This is my article about HuggingChat, can you write a 100-word long conclusion about this topic?

Here’s its response:

“In conclusion, HuggingFace has introduced an impressive open source chatbot called HuggingChat as an alternative to ChatGPT. This AI-driven tool allows users to perform various functions like code generation, email composition, and more. Additionally, it operates over API integration and user interaction via a web platform. Although initially targeting ChatGPT, OpenAssistant, driven primarily by volunteers from LAION (a German nonprofit), looks forward to exploring further possibilities beyond replication. As a result, HuggingChat seems promising due to its accessibility, adaptability, and capability, making it a viable option compared to paid competitors.”

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