Le Chat is powerful, but like all LLMs 🔎, it’s trained on data up to a specific point in time (known as its “knowledge cutoff”).
That means it can’t know about events or information published after training.
🔑 Web search solves this by letting le Chat browse the internet in real time to bring you up-to-date answers and verified sources.
Enable web search
Web search is on by default in new conversations. If you’ve turned it off, click the Tools button in the chat input bar (1) and select Web search (2) to re-enable it.
Enabling Web search in le Chat
Ask a question
Once enabled, Web search works seamlessly: just type your question, and le Chat will search the web when needed.
For example, imagine you’re on a business trip in Paris and you want to know the top ten museums to visit after work.
Searching for the top ten museums in Paris
Because this question requires fresh information, le Chat automatically searches online and provides an answer with sources.
Le Chat’s response with sources included
Notice how:
A “globe” icon indicates that le Chat searched the web.
The answer is structured and easy to read.
Each result links back to the original sources.
🔑 Verifiability is a priority. Whenever le Chat performs a web search, it provides the sources. You can click the links individually, or use the Sources button to view them all in one place.
The sources button at the bottom of the response
The sources panel showing links to original websites
Search the news
Le Chat can also search news from two verified agencies: AFP (Agence France-Presse) and AP (Associated Press).
📌 This ensures that results come from trusted and reliable sources.
For example, you can ask for the latest updates on the French women’s football team:
Le Chat searching AFP for the latest news
When news results are included, you’ll see a “news” icon (1) next to the “globe” icon (2).
As before, you can verify information by following the links or opening the Sources panel.
Next steps
Web search is perfect for quick, targeted questions that require up-to-date information. But what if you need more than that, like a comprehensive report or in-depth analysis?
That’s where Deep research comes in, which we’ll cover in the next article.