It’s been a long time coming, but you may now download Perplexity on your macOS or Windows machine. As a long-term Perplexity Pro user, I’ve been waiting for this moment for some time—but have come away really quite disappointed.
3You Get Nothing Different
Despite the hype on social media, Perplexity’s desktop app offers no unique advantages. It offers the same features as the browser version, and it is less time-consuming to open your web browser and search for what you need. It’s actually what’s known as an Electron wrapper, which is a way developers can “wrap” a web application to allow it to run as a desktop program.
However, Perplexity hasn’t added anything specific to the desktop version. It’s literally just the wrapper. If Perplexity introduced alternative features, the desktop app might be worth downloading. For example, Perplexity couldexpand its social search capabilities. But until then, you’re wasting your time.
2The Desktop App Is Harder to Use
Perplexity’s browser app offers an excellent user experience, but there’s always room for improvement. Launching a desktop app allows Perplexity to fine-tune its search tools for a particular operating system, but that has not been the case.
The desktop app is less intuitive than the browser version. You can see all of your conversations on the left-hand side without clicking on anything in your browser, but this is not the case in the desktop app. Your chats are instead hidden behind the tab on the left.
While not a huge issue, this can initially be frustrating. A better interface would be ideal for helping peopleget more out of a Perplexity Pro subscriptionwhile simultaneously benefiting free users.
1Poor Responsiveness
In addition to being harder to use, the Perplexity desktop app doesn’t have the same responsiveness. Whereas the browser version normally loads quite quickly, Perplexity for desktop often feels like it’s lagging.
Because of this lag, the overall in-app experience is automatically worse. While Perplexity will hopefully fix this issue over time, it’s still something to consider.
Perplexity’s desktop app has a lot of potential, but in its current state, there is no reason to download it. The app feels clunky and lacks useful features that are available in the browser version. You’re better off using the web app.
