Users of PayPal and Venmo in the U.S. and chosen international regions are being granted complimentary early access to Perplexity Comet, the AI-driven browser from the search engine startup.

This Wednesday, PayPal, which owns Venmo, revealed a partnership with Perplexity as part of its new subscriptions platform for overseeing subscriptions linked to PayPal. This includes a complimentary 12-month trial of Perplexity Pro, which offers premium features such as unlimited searches utilizing advanced models and access to third-party models from OpenAI, Anthropic Claude, and Grok. This subscription generally costs $200 per year.

Perplexity launched Comet in July as a browser that incorporates generative AI into web surfing. This consists of features like an AI assistant in the sidebar and AI models that can search the internet and open tabs on your behalf. Comet is also capable of executing tasks for you, such as adding products to your shopping cart and organizing your inbox and calendar. However, these functionalities demand considerable access to your data, raising privacy issues as a factor. Although Perplexity saves most data locally on your device, you still permit Perplexity access to your email, browsing patterns, and additional information.

Initially, Comet was restricted to Perplexity Max ($200 a month) users but has now broadened to include Perplexity Pro subscribers. Mashable evaluated the AI browser and found some summarization features and the sidecar AI assistant to be commendable, yet the agentic functionalities, such as shopping and ordering, were not efficient enough to supplant straightforward human actions.

Now, users of Venmo and PayPal can experience Perplexity Comet for a year without the apprehension of a cost-benefit evaluation. Just keep in mind that the actual cost might be related to your privacy.

How to enroll

There are multiple ways to claim your complimentary Perplexity Pro trial:

• Through the PayPal app or Venmo app

• Via a marketing email you may have received

• A specific Perplexity landing page

Disclosure: Ziff Davis, the parent company of Mashable, filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in April, accusing it of copyright infringement in the training and operation of its AI systems.