AI Chatbots: Our Top 21 Picks for 2024

Whether on Facebook Messenger, their website, or even text messaging, more and more brands are leveraging chatbots to service their customers, market their brands, and even sell their products.

But, the if/then logic that powers many chatbots' conversational abilities limits them from answering unique and new questions, which can hang your customer out to dry and leave them dissatisfied with your customer service — luckily, AI-powered chatbots that can solve that problem are gaining steam.

In this post, we’ll discuss what AI chatbots are and how they work and outline 18 of the best AI chatbots to know about.

The rise of generative AI and language models like GPT and LaMDA (the podcast below discusses how they work) has made way for conversational AI chatbots with advanced capabilities that can mimic a human conversation style, find information online, and produce unique content.

Click here to listen to the full episode

The most important thing to know about an AI chatbot is that it combines ML and NLU to understand what people need and bring the best solutions. Some AI chatbots are better for personal use, like conducting research, and others are best for business use, like featuring a chatbot on your website.

Conversational AI vs Chatbots

Conversational AI and chatbots are related, but they are not exactly the same.

Conversational AI is a broader term that encompasses chatbots, virtual assistants, and other AI-generated applications. It refers to an advanced technology that allows computer programs to understand, interpret, and respond to natural language inputs.

Although AI chatbots are an application of conversational AI, not all chatbots are programmed with conversational AI. For instance, rule-based chatbots use simple rules and decision trees to understand and respond to user inputs. Unlike AI chatbots, rule-based chatbots are more limited in their capabilities because they rely on keywords and specific phrases to trigger canned responses.

Free AI Chatbot Builder

Qualify leads, book meetings, provide customer support, and scale your one-to-one conversations — all with AI-powered chatbots.

• Create chatbots in minutes
• Support customers 24/7
• Qualify leads & book meetings
• And more!

Get started free

Use Cases for AI Chatbots

AI chatbots are used in a wide range of applications across many industries, helping businesses streamline operations and increase productivity, provide better user experiences, and improve customer service. Here are some ways you can use AI chatbots to enhance processes within your organization:

Customer Support

• Provide 24/7 support to your customers
• Address FAQs
• Solve simple issues through a chat interface

Sales and Marketing

• Answer initial inquiries about products and services
• Provide recommendations
• Help customers with purchase decisions

Writing and Editing

• Generate content ideas
• Create article outlines
• Draft emails, social copy, and paragraphs

Recruitment and HR

• Engage with potential job candidates
• Answer basic questions about open positions
• Schedule interviews and meetings

Benefits of AI Chatbots

Having an AI chatbot on your company website can bring numerous benefits, no matter what industry you’re in. Here are a few key advantages:

Improved Customer Experience

AI Chatbots provide instant responses, personalized recommendations, and quick access to information. Additionally, they are available round the clock, enabling your website to provide support and engage with customers at any time, regardless of staff availability.

Efficiency

As your business grows, handling customer queries and requests can become more challenging. AI chatbots can handle multiple conversations simultaneously, reducing the need for manual intervention. This ensures faster response times and improves overall efficiency. Plus, they can handle a large volume of requests and scale effortlessly, accommodating your company's growth without compromising on customer support quality.

Data Gathering and Analysis

AI Chatbots can collect valuable customer data, such as preferences, pain points, and frequently asked questions. This data can be used to improve marketing strategies, enhance products or services, and make informed business decisions.

Lead Generation and Support

AI Chatbots can qualify leads, provide personalized experiences, and assist customers through every stage of their buyer journey. This helps drive more meaningful interactions and boosts conversion rates.

With this in mind, we’ve compiled a list of the best AI chatbots for 2023. Read on to find the right one for you.

Features to Look for in an AI Chatbot

AI chatbots often operate roughly the same way since most are powered by Open AI's GPT models. However, some chatbots still outperform others thanks to key features. Here are some features to look for when experimenting with AI chatbots:

Content Accuracy 

Customers need to be able to trust the information coming from your chatbot, so it's crucial for your chatbot to distribute accurate content.

According to DeepChecks, the standard for AI chatbots is at least 70% accuracy, though I encourage you to strive for higher accuracy. The more accurate, the better.  

Ability to Recognize Typos

Customer chats can and will often include typos, especially if the customer is focused on getting answers quickly and doesn't consider reviewing every message before hitting send. 

So, a valuable AI chatbot must be able to read and accurately interpret customers' inquiries despite any grammatical inconsistencies or typos. 

Sentiment Analysis

Chatbots must be able to assess the tone and overall feeling of the customer's inquiry. Is the customer:

• Angry? ("Why is my monthly payment increasing?!😡")
• Sad? ("Please don't discontinue your lavender chai latte chocolate! It's my favorite flavor. I used to drink it with my dad before he passed."
• Happy? ("I love, love, LOVE the new sneaker designs! Please tell me they come in pink!")

Chatbots with sentimental analysis can adapt to a customer's mood and align their responses so their input is appropriate and tailored to the customer's experience. 

For example, an overly positive response to a customer's disappointment could come off as dismissive and too robotic. 

Sentimental analysis can also prompt a chatbot to reroute angry customers to a human agent who can provide a speedy solution. 

Robust Marketing Capabilities

Chatbots aren't just there to answer consumer questions, they also should help market your brand. A good chatbot will alert your consumers to about relevant deals, discounts, and promotions. 

1. ChatSpot

Price: Free

Get Started with ChatSpot for Free

ChatSpot is HubSpot’s new conversational CRM bot. It combines the capabilities of ChatGPT with unique data sources to help your business grow. You can input your own queries or use one of ChatSpot’s many prompt templates, which can help you find solutions for content writing, research, SEO, prospecting, and more.

For example, I prompted ChatSpot to write a follow-up email to a customer asking about how to set up their CRM.

Though ChatSpot is free for everyone, you experience its full potential when using it with HubSpot. It can help you automate tasks such as saving contacts, notes, and tasks. Plus, it can guide you through the HubSpot app and give you tips on how to best use its tools.

Key Features

• Chat-based commands help sales, marketing, and service professionals maximize productivity
• Draft follow-up emails, compile analytics reports, or even prospect
• Connects to HubSpot software and leverages your existing data

Free AI Chatbot Builder

Qualify leads, book meetings, provide customer support, and scale your one-to-one conversations — all with AI-powered chatbots.

• Create chatbots in minutes
• Support customers 24/7
• Qualify leads & book meetings
• And more!

Get started free

2. ChatGPT

Price: Free; ChatGPT Plus: $20/month

Image Source

I have written about ChatGPT more times than I can count. If you're unfamiliar, it's OpenAI’s conversational chatbot powered by GPT-3.5 and GPT-4.

ChatGPT uses a standard chat interface to communicate with users, and its responses are generated in real-time through deep learning algorithms, which analyze and learn from previous conversations.

Because ChatGPT was pre-trained on a massive data collection, it can generate coherent and relevant responses from prompts in various domains such as finance, healthcare, customer service, and more. In addition to chatting with you, it can also solve math problems, as well as write and debug code.

Both free and paid users of ChatGPT can enjoy unlimited usage. However, ChatGPT Plus subscribers enjoy a few extra perks that free users do not, such as exclusive access to GPT-4, priority access during peak times, and faster response speeds.

Testing ChatGPT

I tested ChatGPT a while back when I wanted to see if it could be used in every phase of blog writing, from ideation to the final draft. You can read about my test here, but here's the summary: 

I asked the chatbot to generate ideas for a blog post about cats. Within seconds, it generated several ideas. I then chose one and asked ChatGPT to generate an outline for that specific idea ("The Economics of Cat Care: How Much Does It Cost to Raise a Cat?").

I then asked ChatGPT to generate a blog post draft. Overall I found that ChatGPT's responses were quick, but it was difficult to get the AI chatbot to generate content that was up to my standard. The draft contained statisitcs that were out of date or couldn't be verified. 

Ultimately, I found that ChatGPT is great for quick responses and ideation, but users should double-check for accuracy.

Key Features

• Uses natural language processing to understand the context of conversations to provide related and original responses in a human-like conversation
• Multiple use cases for things like answering simple questions, ideating and getting inspiration, or generating new content (like a marketing email)
• Improves over time as it has more conversations

3. Bing Chat

Price: Free (requires Microsoft Edge)

Image Source

Microsoft describes Bing Chat as an AI-powered co-pilot for when you conduct web searches. It expands the search capabilities by combining the top results of your search query to give you a single, detailed response. Plus, it cites the sources from where it gets its information.

Bing also has an image creator tool where you can prompt it to create an image of anything you want. You can even give details such as adjectives, locations, or artistic styles so you can get the exact image you envision.

To get the most out of Bing, be specific, ask for clarification when you need it, and tell it how it can improve. You can also ask Bing questions on how to use it so you know exactly how it can help you with something and what its limitations are.

Testing Bing Chat

Testing Bing Chat was pretty simple. First, I asked it to generate an image of a cat wearing a hat to see how it would interpret the request. One look at the image below, and you'll see it passed with flying colors. 

Next, I tested Bing Chat's ability to answer questions quickly and accurately. Naturally, I asked the chatbot something that's been on my mind for a while, "What's going with Kendrick Lamar and Drake?" If you don't know, the two rappers are in a feud. 

Turns out Bing Chat knows the feud pretty well. Within seconds, the chatbot sent information about the artists' relationship going back all the way to 2012 and then included article recommendations for further reading. 

Key Features

• Uses NLP and machine learning to understand conversation prompts
• The compose feature can generate original written content and images, and its powerful search engine capabilities can surface answers from the web
• It’s a conversational tool, so you can continue sending messages until you’re satisfied

The State of Artificial Intelligence Report

New research into how marketers are using AI and key insights into the future of marketing.

• Marketing AI Tools
• Practical Tips
• Trends and Statistics
• And More!

Get Your Free Report Learn more

Download Free

All fields are required.

You're all set!

Click this link to access this resource at any time.

Download Now

4. Gemini

Price: Free

Image Source

Google’s Gemini (formerly called Bard) is a multi-use AI chatbot — it can generate text and spoken responses in over 40 languages, create images, code, answer math problems, and more.

One of Gemini's strengths is that it is great with text. You can use it to write and edit things, such as emails, resumes, and cover letters. Because it’s created by Google, it also features a “Google it” button to help you learn more about a given topic as well as exports to other Google products, like Google Docs and Gmail.

Despite its impressive capabilities, Gemini has faced criticism for providing false and misleading information, especially compared to ChatGPT.

Testing Gemini

I was curious if Gemini could generate images like other similar chatbots, so I asked and was politely told no. 

(IMAGE)

I then tested its ability to answer inquiries and make suggestions by asking the chatbot to send me information about inexpensive, highly-rated hotels in Miami.

Gemini's response was quick and accurate. 

(IMAGE)

Key Features

• Powered by Google’s PaLM-2 (instead of GPT)
• Use it for things like brainstorming and ideation, drafting unique and original content, or getting answers to your questions
• Connected to Google’s website index so it can access information from the internet

5. Jasper Chat

Price: Starts at $39/month

Jasper Chat is built with businesses in mind and allows users to apply AI to their content creation processes. It can help you brainstorm content ideas, write photo captions, generate ad copy, create blog titles, edit text, and more.

Unlike ChatGPT, Jasper pulls knowledge straight from Google to ensure that it provides you with the most accurate information. It also learns your brand’s voice and style, so the content it generates for you sounds less robotic and more like you.

Testing Jasper

I ran a quick of Jasper by asking it to generate a humorous LinkedIn post promoting HubSpot AI tools. Now, I personally wouldn't call the post it generated humorous (but humor is definitely a human thing), however, the post was informative, engaging, and interesting enough to work well for a LinkedIn post. 

Key Features

• Proprietary AI engine sourced from OpenAI and other models.
• Wide breadth of knowledge on niche and elaborate topics.
• Remembers and learns from previous conversations.

6. Perplexity

Price: Free; Pro: $20/month

Image Source

Powered by GPT-3.5, Perplexity is an AI chatbot that acts as a conversational search engine. It’s designed to provide users simple answers to their questions by compiling information it finds on the internet and providing links to its source material.

With no set-up required, Perplexity is pretty easy to access and use. Just simply go to the website or mobile app and type your query into the search bar, then click the blue button. From there, Perplexity will generate an answer, as well as a short list of related topics to read about.

Key Features

• Provides links to sources and generates related queries for further reading.
• Focus setting allows you to narrow your results from specific sources for different purposes, such as WolframAlpha for computational queries or Reddit for discussions and opinions.
• Allows you to save search threads and share them with others.

Note: The six chatbots mentioned above are conversational and generative bots best suited for internal business use for things like ideating, producing content, and getting answers to your queries. Below we’ll go over AI chatbots that are customer-facing.

7. Tidio Lyro

Price: Starts at $29/month

Image Source

Lyro is a conversational AI chatbot created with small and medium businesses in mind. It helps free up the time of customer service reps by engaging in personalized conversations with customers for them.

Lyro instantly learns your company’s knowledge base so it can start resolving customer issues immediately. It also stays within the limits of the data set that you provide in order to prevent hallucinations. And if it can’t answer a query, it will direct the conversation to a human rep.

Key Features

• Provides human-like answers to frequently asked questions.
• Keeps a record of redirected questions so that you can add them to your knowledge base later on.
• Asks customers follow up questions to ensure satisfaction.

8. Kommunicate

Price: Start: $40/mo; Grow: $100/mo; Business: Custom Pricing

Image Source

Kommunicate is a human + Chatbot hybrid platform designed to help businesses improve customer engagement and support.

The platform helps businesses build chatbots and manage customer interactions across multiple channels, including website chat, messenger apps, and email.

Although you can train your Kommunicate chatbot on various intents, it is designed to automatically route the conversation to a customer service rep whenever it can’t answer a query.

Key Features

• Conversational AI and NLP capabilities, which allow businesses to automate aspects of customer support, such as answering frequently asked questions or routing customers to the right support agent.
• Offers a range of integration options, allowing businesses to seamlessly incorporate it into their existing workflows.
• Provides advanced analytics and reporting capabilities, allowing businesses to track and analyze customer interactions and support metrics.

9. HubSpot Chatbot Builder

Price: Free

Free Chatbot Builder Software

HubSpot has a powerful and easy-to-use chatbot builder that allows you to automate and scale live chat conversations.

Keep in mind that HubSpot‘s chat builder software doesn’t quite fall under the “AI chatbot” category of “AI chatbot” because it uses a rule-based system. However, HubSpot does have code snippets, allowing you to leverage the powerful AI of third-party NLP-driven bots such as Dialogflow.

Key Features

• Customers can get answers to frequently asked questions, book meetings, and navigate through your site.
• Conversations are stored in your CRM so you can qualify leads and trigger automation flows.
• Easy integration across your marketing, sales, and service tools because HubSpot is a CRM platform.

The State of Artificial Intelligence Report

New research into how marketers are using AI and key insights into the future of marketing.

• Marketing AI Tools
• Practical Tips
• Trends and Statistics
• And More!

Get Your Free Report Learn more

Download Free

All fields are required.

You're all set!

Click this link to access this resource at any time.

Download Now

10. Intercom Fin

Price: $0.99/resolution (requires Intercom subscription, which starts at $74/month)

Image Source

Fin is Intercom’s conversational AI platform, designed to help businesses automate conversations and provide personalized experiences to customers at scale.

Built on ChatGPT, Fin allows companies to build their own custom AI chatbots using Intercom’s tools and APIs. It uses your company’s knowledge base to answer customer queries and provides links to the articles in references.

In addition to having conversations with your customers, Fin can ask you questions when it doesn’t understand something. When it isn’t able to provide an answer to a complex question, it flags a customer service rep to help resolve the issue.

Key Features

• Built-in safeguards to ensure it only provides accurate responses to customer questions.
• Fin Conversations allows you to easily view Fin’s interactions with customers from your inbox.
• Create custom answers to FAQs that get prioritized over AI generated answers.

11. DevRev

Price: Starter: $9.99/mo; Pro: $24.99/mo

Image Source

DevRev's modern support platform empowers customers and customer-facing teams to access relevant information, enabling more effective communication.
Tailored to user preferences, adjusted easily, and backed by valuable data about products and users, DevRev helps businesses enhance their customer experience.

Key Features

• Removes bottlenecks by empowering more people in your organization to do the work that previously only your data team could do.
• Brings support people, PMs, and developers onto an AI-native platform to automate L1, assist
  L2, and elevate L3 to become true collaborators.
• Resolves the majority of your support questions with AI-powered deflection and significantly decreases support volume.

12. SmythOS

Price: Contact for pricing

Image Source

SmythOS is a multi-agent operating system that harnesses the power of AI to streamline complex business workflows. Their platform features a visual no-code builder, allowing you to customize agents for your unique needs. From Fortune 100 companies to startups, SmythOS is setting the stage to transform every company into an AI-powered entity with efficiency, security, and scalability. With SmythOS, you can automate workflows to save your team time.

Key Features

• Tailored AI Agent Development allows easy visual development of specialized AI agents tuned for specific functions.
• Seamlessly coordinates all AI agents for unified responses and workflows.  
• Drag-and-drop interface simplifies even the most complex workflow automation so you can connect data, models, and skills visually without coding. 

13. Watson Assistant

Price: Free - $140/month

Image Source

IBM Watson Assistant is an AI-powered conversational bot that gives you impressive recommendations for further training so it gets better at its job. Its intent recommendations flag topic clusters that should be added to the database, while its entity recommendations identify existing topics that need more depth.

Watson Assistant is trained with data that is unique to your industry and business so it provides users with relevant information. It can run on your website, messaging channels, customer service tools, and mobile app. Plus, you can quickly get started with the low-code chat builder.

Key Features

• NLP and machine learning to gather context.
• Integrates with multiple systems and databases to access information.
• Analytics and insights to monitor user interactions, understand user behavior, and improve overall performance.

14. Juro’s Legal AI Assistant

Price: Contact for pricing

Juro’s AI assistant lives within a contract management platform that enables legal and business teams to manage their contracts from start to finish in one place, without having to leave their browser. 

This means you only need one platform. No more jumping between eSigning tools, Word files, and shared drives. Juro’s contract AI meets users in their existing processes and workflows, encouraging quick and easy adoption. 

Key Features

• Users can prompt Juro’s AI chatbot to draft and amend contract terms, allowing them to revise and refine clauses instantly 
• The AI Assistant can speed up contract review times by scanning documents for key risks and deviations
• Juro’s AI can be used to summarize whole contracts or individual clauses, making contract data accessible to key stakeholders in seconds

15. Drift

Price: Contact for pricing

Image Source

Drift is an automation-powered conversational bot to help you communicate with site visitors based on their behavior. With its intent detection capabilities, Drift can interpret open-ended questions, determine what information users are looking for, and provide them with a relevant answer or route the conversation to the appropriate team.

Drift’s AI technology enables it to personalize website experiences for visitors based on their browsing behavior and past interactions. It can also seamlessly book meetings and qualify leads.

In addition to its chatbot, Drift’s live chat features use GPT to provide suggested replies to customers queries based on their website, marketing materials, and conversational context.

Key Features

• Rule-based and AI chatbot with a classifier that categorizes conversations by context for more meaningful conversations.
• Can handle context switching if the conversation flow or subject changes.
• Customizable chat widget for mobile and desktop with helpful out-of-the-box integrations.

16. Infobip

Price: Contact for pricing

Image Source

Infobip’s chatbot building platform, Answers, helps you design your ideal conversation flow with a drag-and-drop builder. It allows you to create both rules-based and intent-based chatbots, with the latter using AI and NLP to recognize user intent, process information, and provide a human-like conversational experience.

Infobip also has a generative AI-powered conversation cloud called Experiences that is currently in beta. In addition to the generative AI chatbot, it also includes customer journey templates, integrations, analytics tools, and a guided interface.

Key Features

• AI and machine learning help you train your chatbot.
• Rule and intent-based bots that understand the context of and replicate a conversational experience.
• Omnichannel usability for WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Etc.

17. Appy Pie Chatbot

Price: Starts at $6 per bot/month

Image Source

Appy Pie helps you design a wide range of conversational chatbots with a no-code builder.

Appy Pie's Chatbot Builder simplifies the process of creating and deploying chatbots, allowing businesses to engage with customers, automate workflows, and provide support without the need for coding. The customizable templates, NLP capabilities, and integration options make it a user-friendly option for businesses of all sizes.

Appy Pie also has a GPT-4 powered AI Virtual Assistant builder, which can also be used to intelligently answer customer queries and streamline your customer support process.

Key Features

• GPT-3 powered intuitive chatbot with contextual understanding.
• Leverages your business data to give accurate results to queries.
• Deploy a chatbot on your website or mobile app.

18. Zendesk Answer Bot

Price: Starts at $55per agent/month

Image Source

Zendesk Answer Bot integrates with your knowledge base and leverages data to have quality, omnichannel conversations. Zendesk’s no-code Flow Builder tool makes creating customized AI chatbots a piece of cake. Plus, it’s super easy to make changes to your bot so you’re always solving for your customers.

Each Zendesk Suite plan includes standard chatbot capabilities. However, you can access Zendesk’s Advanced AI with an add-on to your plan for $50 per agent/month. The add-on includes advanced bots, intelligent triage, intelligent insights and suggestions, and macro suggestions for admins.

Key Features

• Use Flow Builder to create custom AI-powered conversation flows.
• Deep learning capabilities to contextualize conversations and understand intent.
• Escalation to live agents who get insights and suggestions from AI to bring quick solutions.

The State of Artificial Intelligence Report

New research into how marketers are using AI and key insights into the future of marketing.

• Marketing AI Tools
• Practical Tips
• Trends and Statistics
• And More!

Get Your Free Report Learn more

Download Free

All fields are required.

You're all set!

Click this link to access this resource at any time.

Download Now

19. Salesforce Einstein

Price: Available through cloud products

Image Source

Salesforce Einstein is a conversational bot that natively integrates with all Salesforce products. It can handle common inquiries in a conversational manner, provide support, and even complete certain transactions. Plus, it is multilingual so you can easily scale your customer service efforts all across the globe.

Einstein Bots seamlessly integrate with Salesforce Service Cloud, allowing Salesforce users to leverage the power of their CRM. Bots can access customer data, update records, and trigger workflows within the Service Cloud environment, providing a unified view of customer interactions.

Key Features

• Powered by predictive intelligence and machine learning.
• Builds contextual understanding and leverages existing Salesforce data to surface the best responses.
• Routing to human agents for more pressing conversations.

20. LivePerson

Price: Contact for pricing

Image Source

LivePerson’s AI chatbot is built on 20+ years of messaging transcripts. It can answer customer inquiries, schedule appointments, provide product recommendations, suggest upgrades, provide employee support, and manage incidents.

This AI chatbot can support extended messaging sessions, allowing customers to continue conversations over time without losing context. When needed, it can also transfer conversations to live customer service reps, ensuring a smooth handoff while providing information the bot gathered during the interaction.

Key Features

• The intent manager leverages data to understand the context of conversations.
• Create automated conversation flows across different messaging channels (website, mobile app, Apple Business Chat, etc.)
• Point and click builder to quickly and seamlessly create your bot.

21. Ada

Price: Contact for pricing

Image Source

Ada is an automated AI chatbot with support for 50+ languages on key channels like Facebook, WhatsApp, and WeChat. It’s built on large language models (LLMs) that allow it to recognize and generate text in a human-like manner.

The drag-and-drop chat builder requires zero coding and offers smart suggestions to help quickly train your chatbot. That way, you can spend less time on fine-tuning your chatbot, and more time on deep work.

Key Features

• Uses pre-trained machine learning models that you can refine to meet your business needs.
• Intent detection understands context and uses profiles and metadata to personalize conversations.
• Connected to your business’ crucial data to bring appropriate solutions.

Want to learn more about artificial intelligence? Check out this learning path.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in March 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.