People use chatbots for all different reasons. A recent study highlighted how the public uses ChatGPT, and surprisingly, users leaned on the chatbot for personal queries more often than professional ones.
But what if every prompt you typed, be it for work, school, or personal use, also did something good for the planet? That’s the idea behind Ecosia Chat, the AI assistant from the search engine best known for planting trees.
Like ChatGPT or Gemini, you can use Ecosia Chat to brainstorm, plan trips or draft emails. The difference is that it offers a climate-friendly perspective. Since the search engine launched back in 2009, Ecosia has funded the planting of more than 240 million trees in biodiversity hotspots around the world and poured more than $104 million into climate action projects — all from ad revenue. Now, that same mission extends to its chatbot.
How Ecosia Chat works
Under the hood, Ecosia Chat runs on OpenAI’s GPT-4; this is great news for ChatGPT users logging in to OpenAI’s legacy model without the subscription price tag. But there’s an environmental twist; a toggle called Green Answers bumps sustainability to the top.
With it switched on, you’ll still get useful responses but framed with an eco-friendly lens. Don’t worry, Ecosia Chat won’t force every conversation to be about climate like that one person who brings kale to every potluck. But it does steer your ideas toward greener choices when it naturally makes sense.
For example, if you’re planning a trip, it might suggest eco-certified hotels or direct flights instead of multiple layovers.
A growing trend in eco-friendly chatbots
Ecosia isn’t alone in this niche. There’s a small but growing wave of AI assistants designed to give back to the environment:
- EcoBots plants a tree for every 10 questions asked, in partnership with WWF.
- Earthly Insight funnels part of its subscription revenue into rewilding projects through the Global Rewilding Alliance.
- Recycling Partnership Chatbot tells you what’s recyclable in your specific community.
- GreenPT runs on efficient, low-power AI models hosted by renewable energy providers to keep its footprint smaller.
Together, these projects show that chatbots can actually be vehicles for climate action while also providing users with helpful responses.
The catch is AI’s own footprint
Of course, there’s an irony here. Large language models use a lot of energy, and Ecosia openly admits that AI increases emissions. Their approach is to offset that impact by investing in renewable energy and planting even more trees.
The takeaway
If you’re already using AI assistants like ChatGPT, Ecosia Chat is worth a look, especially if sustainability matters to you. It’s free, easy to access through Ecosia’s search engine and even comes with a browser extension.
I’ll admit, it’s not my daily driver. I still rely more on the big-name bots, but Ecosia Chat has earned a spot on my list of top 10 favorite chatbots. Even if you only use it occasionally, toggling on Green Answers can spark new ways of thinking about your choices, whether that’s how you shop, how you travel or just how you run your day.
Ecosia Chat isn’t going to save the planet by itself, but it’s part of a bigger movement to build AI that gives back instead of just taking resources. And honestly, if you’re going to chat with an AI anyway, why not choose one that plants a few trees along the way?
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