A complete overview based on Perplexity reviews (2025)

You’ve probably heard about Perplexity AI. It’s been making waves as an "answer engine," a tool that wants to replace your endless Google searches with straight-up, sourced answers. The promise is simple: less clicking through ads and blue links, and more getting the information you actually need. But does it deliver?

To find out, we dove deep into user reviews, Reddit threads, and hands-on tests to get a clear picture. In this post, we’ll walk through what Perplexity does well, its best features, pricing, and some of the key limitations that keep popping up in Perplexity reviews, especially for businesses trying to use AI in their day-to-day work.

What is Perplexity AI?

Think of Perplexity AI as what you’d get if a traditional search engine and a chatbot like ChatGPT had a baby. At its heart, it’s a search tool that you can talk to. When you ask it a question, it doesn’t just rely on old training data. It actively searches the internet in real time, reads a bunch of sources, and then stitches the information together into a single, easy-to-read answer.

Its best trick is transparency. Perplexity doesn’t just spit out information and expect you to take its word for it. Every answer comes with numbered citations that link you directly to the articles or web pages it used. The goal is to give you a well-researched summary without you having to open twenty browser tabs yourself. It’s built to be more of a research assistant than a creative writer, focused on giving you verifiable facts, fast.

A deep dive into Perplexity AI’s core features

Perplexity isn’t just a simple search bar. It’s an interactive tool that combines live web access with AI smarts and gives you a good amount of control over the results. Let’s break down the key features that make it work.

Conversational search with real-time sources

The main reason people use Perplexity is that you can ask it questions in plain English, just like you’d ask a colleague. It then goes out and finds the most current information available online. This is a huge leg up on many large language models (LLMs) that are stuck in the past, unable to tell you anything about recent events.

And, of course, there are the in-line citations. Every major point in its answer has a little number next to it. Click it, and you’re taken straight to the source. This makes it incredibly easy to check its work or dig deeper into a topic.

Focus modes and access to multiple LLMs

One of the coolest things about Perplexity is that you can tell it where to look for answers. The "Focus" feature lets you narrow its search to specific places, which is super handy for targeted research. You can limit your search to:

• Academic: It will stick to scholarly articles and research papers.

• YouTube: It will search for answers within video transcripts.

• Reddit: It scans discussion threads to find opinions and real-world experiences.

• Wolfram|Alpha: It pulls from a computational engine for hard data and calculations. If you spring for the Pro plan, Perplexity also turns into a command center for several of the world’s top AI models. You can easily switch between them depending on whether you need raw speed, creative writing, or deep analysis.

Model	Best For	Provider
Sonar Large	Fast, concise, and accurate answers	Perplexity AI
GPT-4o	Advanced reasoning and complex problem-solving	OpenAI
Claude 3 Opus	Nuanced understanding and natural language	Anthropic
Mistral Large	Strong reasoning and multilingual capabilities	Mistral AI

File uploads and the "pro search" copilot

You’re not just limited to the web; you can bring your own documents into the conversation. Perplexity lets you upload PDFs, text files, and even images, and then ask questions about them. It’s perfect for getting a quick summary of a long report or figuring out what’s in a photo without having to describe it.

The "Pro Search" feature (formerly known as Copilot) makes this even more effective. When you turn it on, the AI will first ask you a few clarifying questions before it starts searching. This little back-and-forth helps it understand exactly what you’re looking for, leading to a much more detailed and relevant answer on the first try.

Research vs. business use: Where it shines and where it falls short

Perplexity is a genuinely cool tool, but whether it’s right for you really boils down to what you need it for. It’s a rockstar in some scenarios and a total non-starter in others, especially in a business context.

The researcher’s advantage

If you’re a student, academic, or journalist, Perplexity can feel like a superpower. The ability to pull key takeaways from dense research papers in seconds is incredible. The "Academic" focus mode cuts through the noise, and the automatic citations make building a reference list or fact-checking a claim almost effortless. For anyone whose job is to synthesize information from the web, it’s a massive time-saver.

The business gap: Limitations for customer support and internal knowledge

But here’s where the wheels come off for business use. Perplexity is designed to search the public internet and files you manually upload one at a time. It can’t securely connect to a company’s private, internal knowledge base, which is where all the actually useful information for running a business lives.

Think about it: a support agent needs an AI that can access past tickets, internal troubleshooting guides, and specific product information to solve a customer issue. An employee asking about a company policy needs an AI that can read your private Confluence pages or internal docs. A general-purpose tool just can’t do that.

This is where specialized platforms like eesel AI are built to shine. They’re designed from the ground up to connect all of a company’s scattered knowledge, from tickets in Zendesk to guides in Google Docs, creating a secure AI assistant that actually understands your business.

This infographic shows how eesel AI connects to various internal knowledge sources, a key business limitation noted in Perplexity reviews.:

Common themes: What real users are saying

Dig into any Reddit thread or Trustpilot page about Perplexity, and you’ll start to see the same comments over and over. People love the idea, but the execution can be a bit wobbly.

Concerns over accuracy and reliability

A recurring complaint in Perplexity reviews is that the AI can sometimes just… make things up. Users report that it occasionally "hallucinates" and presents wrong information with confidence. Other times, it pulls from questionable sources like random Discord chats and cites them as if they were a peer-reviewed study. <quote text="One Redditor mentioned that for niche research topics, it often "produces answers based on surface level information."" sourceIcon="https://www.iconpacks.net/icons/2/free-reddit-logo-icon-2436-thumb.png" sourceName="Reddit" sourceLink="https://www.reddit.com/r/perplexity_ai/comments/1cltxyr/thoughts_on_perplexity_the_pros_and_cons/">

For personal curiosity, a wrong answer is annoying. For a business trying to help a customer, it’s a real problem. You simply can’t risk giving out incorrect information. This is why business-focused platforms like eesel AI have features like a powerful simulation mode. You can test the AI on thousands of your past support conversations in a safe environment to see exactly how it will perform and ensure it’s accurate before it ever talks to a real customer.

A screenshot of the eesel AI simulation mode, which addresses the accuracy concerns raised in Perplexity reviews by allowing businesses to test AI performance on real data.:

Issues with subscriptions and customer support

Another big red flag that pops up in reviews is frustration with billing and support. Dozens of Trustpilot reviews tell stories of unexpected charges, subscriptions that are nearly impossible to cancel, and a customer support team that’s nowhere to be found. Users also feel burned when paid features or specific AI models are removed without notice. One reviewer summed up their cancellation attempt as "like the Mafia, you can’t get out." This lack of reliable support is a non-starter for any business.

Perplexity AI pricing plans

Perplexity runs on a freemium model. The free version is great for playing around, but the paid plans unlock the most powerful features and give you higher usage limits. Here’s how it breaks down.

Feature	Free Plan	Pro Plan ($20/month)	Enterprise Plan (Custom)
Pro Searches	5 every 4 hours	300+ per day	Unlimited
AI Model Access	Standard models	GPT-4o, Claude 3, Mistral Large, etc.	Everything in Pro
File Uploads	Limited	Unlimited	Unlimited
API Credits	No	$5/month included	Custom
Security & Privacy	Standard	Standard	SOC2 Compliance, SSO, User Management

The verdict: Is a general "answer engine" enough for your business?

So, what’s the final word? Perplexity is a clever and genuinely useful tool for personal research. If you want to brainstorm ideas, get up to speed on a topic, or just find better answers online, it’s fantastic. The citation feature alone is a huge step up from other chatbots.

However, the user Perplexity reviews show that it’s just not built for the demands of a business. The gaps in reliability, support, and most importantly, its inability to access private company knowledge make it a risky bet for anything mission-critical. A generic tool that only knows about the public web can’t replace an AI that knows your business inside and out.

For teams looking to automate customer support, manage tickets, or build an internal Q&A bot, you really need a tool that’s designed for that specific job. That’s exactly what eesel AI does. It’s built to solve the problems that generalist tools can’t touch.

• Go live in minutes, not months: eesel AI is a self-serve platform. You can connect it to your helpdesk, like Zendesk or Intercom, with a single click. No sales demos or developers needed.

• Unify your knowledge, instantly: It learns from your company’s unique data by training on past support tickets, internal wikis in Confluence, and documents in Google Docs.

• Total control and confident testing: You can simulate its performance on your own historical data to verify its accuracy and tweak its personality to match your brand.

• Transparent pricing: Unlike the confusing billing stories from Perplexity users, eesel AI offers clear, predictable plans. There are no hidden fees that charge you per resolution.

If you’re just looking for a smarter way to search the web, give Perplexity a try. But if you’re serious about putting AI to work for your business, you need a tool that’s actually built for business.