5 projects Perplexity’s new Labs AI tool can whip up for you now – in minutes
Lance Whitney / Elyse Betters Picaro / ZDNETDesigning a detailed web app, dashboard, or even spreadsheet might take you hours to complete. What if someone or something could do the same work in just a few minutes? That’s the idea behind the new Labs tool from Perplexity AI.In a blog post published Thursday, Perplexity explained how Labs can create anything from reports to spreadsheets to dashboards to simple web apps. The new feature is accessible only to Pro subscribers, who pay $20 per month (though there are a couple of ways to score the plan for free). Also: The best AI chatbots: ChatGPT, Copilot, and notable alternativesThis new capability is available on Perplexity’s website and in its iOS and Android apps. The company has also promised its imminent arrival in its Windows and Mac apps. Perplexity Labs is content creation to the nth degree. The tool can help you design and complete a host of projects, both personally and professionally. Whether you’re cooking up a meal plan, analyzing your financial situation, or developing a marketing campaign, you can use Labs to flesh out your idea from start to finish. Also: How AI coding agents could destroy open source softwareThat all sounds helpful. But what’s really cool is the way Perplexity Labs can build interactive content for you.To kick things off, simply choose the Labs icon at the prompt and submit your request. Labs then goes into action, consulting the necessary web sources, compiling the data, and finally creating your project. It will even tell you how many minutes it will take to complete the job, typically at least 10 minutes, but sometimes longer, depending on the project. What can Perplexity Labs generate?1. Computer code Tell Labs the purpose of your code or program, and it will write it for you. The tool can tackle specific tasks such as structuring data, applying formulas, and creating charts. It will then execute the code to see how it works. From there, you’re able to modify your request or description, and Labs will update the code for you. 2. Reports Give Labs the topic of the report you want created, and it will gather and compile the required information. In response, it builds a dynamic report with text, charts, graphs, and images. Any files it creates during the process are placed in an Assets section, so you can view and download them all. Also: Perplexity is the AI tool Gemini wishes it could beTo try this out, I told Labs to create a report that correlates each arrival of Halley’s Comet with significant events that occurred on Earth. After several minutes of data gathering and asset creation, the tool served up a detailed report with links, charts, and images (including one amazing image of a tapestry from 1066 showing the arrival of the comet). The report itself was well documented and organized, breaking down the information into different sections. 3. Spreadsheets Here, Labs can design anything from a simple table to a complex, interactive spreadsheet. Again, just give it the subject or goal of the spreadsheet. The tool finds the necessary information and builds what you need. Also: What is Perplexity Deep Research, and how do you use it?To try this out, I asked Labs to design an interactive spreadsheet for a Sudoku puzzle. In response, it took to the web to gather the rules and regulations for Sudoku and then designed a spreadsheet that I could access online or download to my PC. More
