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"Grok 3 is an order of magnitude more capable than Grok 2,” Musk said during a live-streamed presentation. AFP

Elon Musk-led startup xAI has launched its most powerful AI chatbot yet -- Grok 3, positioning it as a direct competitor to OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Gemini.

The rollout began on Tuesday, with Premium Plus subscribers on X getting early access.

Released late on Monday, Grok 3 marks a major step forward for xAI, which was founded by Elon Musk in 2023. Along with the launch, new features for the Grok iOS and web apps were also unveiled, CNBC reported.

"Grok 3 is an order of magnitude more capable than Grok 2," Musk said during a live-streamed presentation. "[It's a] maximally truth-seeking AI, even if that truth is sometimes at odds with what is politically correct."

Grok 3 can analyze images, answer questions, and was integrated into Musk's social media network, X. It was in development for months and, although originally expected in 2024, it was released later than planned.

Musk showcased Grok 3's improvements over Grok 2, especially in reasoning and performance. He also mentioned how rapid innovation is key to technological success.

Key features

Training and power: xAI used a huge data center in Memphis with 200,000 GPUs to train Grok 3, claiming it has 10 times more computing power than Grok 2. The new model also uses a bigger set of data, including court case files, reported TechCrunch.

Different versions: Grok 3 comes in different versions, such as Grok 3 mini, which answers faster, but with less accuracy. Some features are still in beta, but they started rolling out this week.

Performance on tests: xAI claims Grok 3 beats GPT-4o on tests like AIME (math) and GPQA (advanced science). It also scored well in the Chatbot Arena, where users vote on AI responses.

Review of Grok 3

Andrej Karpathy, former AI director at Tesla, tested Grok 3 and compared it to models from OpenAI and DeepSeek. He praised Grok 3's "Thinking" mode, calling it "state of the art." Karpathy highlighted its ability to create a Settlers of Catan-style web page -- something other models struggled with.

He also found Grok 3 excelled at solving tic-tac-toe puzzles and answering tough math questions, unlike some competitors.

Karpathy was impressed with Grok 3's "DeepSearch" feature, which gave high-quality research answers, but noted that it was not as advanced as OpenAI's research tools. Grok 3 also did have trouble with tasks like decoding emoji puzzles and generating creative images, like a pelican on a bicycle.

How to start using Grok 3

Subscribe to X Premium Plus: Grok 3 is currently available only to X Premium Plus subscribers.

Use the Grok App or website: Users can also access Grok 3 through the Grok iOS app or the new website at grok.com. An Android version is also available for pre-registration on Google Play.

Super Grok for early access: For the most advanced features and early updates, you can subscribe to "Super Grok," a premium tier giving priority access to the latest developments.

Continuous updates: Grok 3 will get regular updates, with improvements being rolled out as often as every 24 hours, so keep checking for new features.