What is Perplexity AI up to? Although they’re not quite on the level of household names like Google and ChatGPT, they’ve boldly pitched a public and entirely unsolicited offer to Google for the purchase of its Chrome internet browser for $34.5 billion.
Are they truly attempting to buy the world’s most dominant internet browser from the titan that is Google? Or are they merely making a bid for public attention in their ongoing battle for public visibility against ChatGPT?
If it’s the latter, it’s working, as news outlets from the BBC to The New York Times to the Wall Street Journal, breathlessly cover the surprise bid, to say nothing yet of the tech press.
a perplexing (but ballsy) offer
If the name rings a bell but isn’t quite tripping the cords of recognition, Perplexity is a generative AI that competes, sort of, against ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Deepseek, and Grok, although it’s different enough from all these that I’d consider it a distinct species under the same genus of “generative AI.” Perplexity is more research-focused and less of a chatbot.
I’ve been using Perplexity AI’s Comet browser for about a month now, and I’m pretty impressed. However, I’m not (quite) yet ready to unleash upon you all my thoughts, feelings, hopes, aspirations, and indulgences in a full review.
Comet is based on the free, open-source Chromium browser technology that underpins Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge. Still, it weaves in Perplexity’s AI technology much more thoroughly than any other browser currently available for public consumption.
Comet hasn’t even yet been completely rolled out to the public, as Perplexity AI has instead chosen to roll it out gradually, first among its Perplexity Max subscribers, and on August 14, 2025, to all Perplexity Pro subscribers. Previously, Pro subscribers had to sign up on a waitlist.
What might happen to Comet if Google takes Perplexity AI up on their offer to buy Chrome? There’d be no need for Perplexity AI to split its attentions among two Chromium-based browsers. I imagine it’d just fold into Chrome the more successful aspects of Comet thus far and wrap Comet into the dustbin of discontinued software.
Google is, after all, attempting to fend off charges brought against it by the US Department of Justice that it’s an unfair monopoly. Could it be afraid that it’ll have to split up, and might it sell off Chrome before that could happen?
I doubt it, honestly. Google doesn’t lack for money, hubris, or—most importantly—money, which I’m saying twice because it could wind up being the most significant factor in this dogfight between Google and the US government.
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