OpenAI has announced Canvas, a new way for users to interact with ChatGPT This is the first major redesign since the experimental launch of the app in November 2022

ChatGPT Canvas is not just a new user interface, but an AI-first text and code editor that can adapt any single element or entire project with the help of AI

As OpenAI explains in a blog post, Canvas will be available through a new option in the model drop-down menu called “ChatGPT 4o with Canvas” Once selected, it will open in a separate window and allow you to collaborate with ChatGPT In the demo, we saw it retrieve live data from an AI web search and adapt some of the text of a longer article to reflect the new data

OpenAI also trained ChatGPT to recognize when a chat prompt triggers a new canvas rather than responding in a regular chat window

This is an early beta version, and OpenAI says it will work with ChatGPT to create and refine ideas to present “new ways of working together” It will first be available to Plus and Team subscribers today, with Enterprise and Education users gaining access next week [ChatGPT Canvas is a mixture of several popular AI products, including existing platforms like Anthropic's Claude Artifacts, Cursor AI, and Google Docs

This is essentially a way to work directly with the AI on the project, which is a big improvement with respect to small fixes or changes to specific elements These tasks can be confusing and lose their flow when using a chat interface

OpenAI says much the same thing, explaining in a statement that “the chat interface is easy to use and works well for many tasks, but has limitations when you want to work on a project that requires editing and modification,” adding that “Canvas is a new interface for this kind of work,” he added

“You can highlight specific areas to show ChatGPT exactly what you want it to focus on Like a copy editor or code reviewer, you can provide in-line feedback and suggestions with the entire project in mind,” the spokesperson explains

The biggest change is that, unlike the Claude Artifact, you can edit any element directly in the canvas It becomes a text or code editor with rich text, including bold and italic text

The side pop-out menu has a series of writing controls These include buttons for adjusting the length of the text (providing a slider to change the scale) and for adapting the reading level from, for example, graduation to kindergarten

Currently, Canvas cannot be used for anything other than writing and coding, but it is incredibly powerful in such use cases Canvas is displayed next to chat

In addition to writing prompts in chat, once the content appears on the canvas, you can highlight specific sections to indicate where you want ChatGPT to focus its attention Like a copy editor or code reviewer, you can provide inline feedback and suggestions that take the entire project into account

OpenAI told us: “This model knows when to open the canvas, make targeted edits, and completely rewrite It also understands the broader context and provides precise feedback and suggestions”

Canvases open automatically when ChatGPT detects a scenario that might help solve a problem, but you can also open an empty canvas from the menu or tell ChatGPT to “Use Canvas” on an existing project

Getting ChatGPT to function as a collaborator rather than an advisor was not an easy task, and OpenAI researchers have been able to trigger canvases when needed, create different types of content, make targeted edits They had to develop a variety of new “core behaviors,” such as

Another feature the model had to be trained on was to critique rather than just go and make changes This works through a “comment-like” box next to code elements, similar to the comments in Google Docs, which can even highlight relevant text or lines of code

“The key challenge was to define when to trigger the canvas We taught the model to open the canvas for prompts like 'write a blog post about the history of coffee beans,' while over-triggering for general Q&A tasks like 'help me create a new recipe for dinner' We tried to avoid them,” the company explained in a blog post

According to OpenAI, this is just the first beta release, with rapid upgrades planned in the coming months Although they did not go into details, it is likely to include the addition of DALL-E images, more editing features, and the ability to load multiple canvas elements in a single chat thread

For now, what ChatGPT Canvas presents is a paradigm shift in the way we collaborate with artificial intelligence: instead of letting the AI do all the work and then editing it later, we can work on projects with it as a partner