Research & search

For a question you have to check, Perplexity is first because the citations are part of the answer, not an afterthought.

Best for: Research questions that need links you can open.

When the sources are a pile you already have, NotebookLM stays on those sources instead of wandering the open web.

Best for: Reading docs, papers, or transcripts you uploaded.

Perplexity is where a person researches. Exa is what you call when the product you are building needs search.

Best for: Adding web search to an agent or an app.

When the claim is a research claim, Consensus searches papers. A general chat is a worse place to start.

Best for: Checking a scientific claim against published papers.