Google Rolls Out AI Chatbot Bard In Nine Indian Languages

Tech giant Google on Thursday (July 13) said it has rolled out multiple updates for its generative artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot Bard, including support for multiple Indian languages.

Google Bard will now support more than 40 languages globally, including nine Indian languages – Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Gujarati, and Urdu. This update now allows users from various regions to engage with Bard in their native languages, enhancing accessibility and usability, the company said in a statement. 

Additionally, users will be able to listen to Bard’s responses in these 40 languages. Bard users will also have the option to change the tone and style of Bard’s responses (currently available only in English) across different formats, be it long, short or casual. 

Besides, Google has also introduced new features to allow Bard users to add images to prompts, enabling the chatbot to analyse and provide relevant information or captions. 

The company also said it has expanded the offering to new countries. Inc42 has reached out to Google for more clarity on which nations has Google expanded Bard to. The story will be updated on receiving a response from the company. 

The updates come two months after the company, at its flagship tech event Google I/O 2023, announced that it was rolling out the feature to more than 180 countries across the globe. 

Bard’s underlying architecture is based on Google’s neural network architecture called Transformers and the in-house large language model (LLM) called LaMDA. This enables the chatbot to process and understand user queries with improved context and nuance. 

By leveraging its extensive training data, Bard can generate more natural and conversational responses, offering an enhanced alternative to traditional keyword-based search. 

However, despite Bard’s impressive features, Google acknowledges that there is still room for improvement. The company plans to integrate Bard more closely with its suite of products, including Drive, Gmail, and Docs, and explore further advancements in visual responses and integration with the search engine.

While Bard’s India launch faced delays and challenges, Google’s commitment to technological advancements and leveraging its extensive data reserves position it well in the AI chatbot landscape. As the AI war intensifies and new innovations emerge, Bard’s confident self-assessment as a superior conversational tool further fuels the competition between Google and its rivals.

Last month, OpenAI also rolled out a language update for its generative AI chatbot ChatGPT. The chatbot can now be accessed in various Indian languages – Hindi, Kannada, Gujarati, Kannada, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Bhojpuri, Bengali, Punjabi and Malayalam.