Enterprise search: AI tools compared (4)

What enterprise search tools are for

Enterprise search tools help you find information spread across workplace documents and applications. Depending on the service, they retrieve relevant passages, answer questions or summarise what they find. They support teams that regularly consult procedures, meeting notes, customer records and other internal knowledge. The practical benefit is a starting answer that brings relevant material together for review. For example, you might previously have searched folders and message threads to find the approval process for a sales proposal. With a connected search tool, you can ask the question and inspect the documents behind its answer, where source references are supported. Glean provides answers that cite internal documents. UnSoloMind lets you build a knowledge base from imported files and ask questions about them. Results depend on which sources are available, how current they are and whether access permissions have been configured and maintained appropriately.

Example uses:

• Find the internal procedure that applies to a specific request without manually browsing folders across different teams.
• Retrieve decisions recorded in meeting notes when preparing a discussion or returning to an existing project.
• Ask questions about imported knowledge documents to prepare practical guidance for a colleague joining your team.
• Summarise information found in internal documents to understand the background of a case before a conversation.
• Locate documents addressing a recurring question and check their versions before sharing an answer with colleagues.

Our picks by need

These picks follow simple rules applied to the verified data, with no partnership or affiliate link:

• Best scored : Dust. 65/100 on our access and transparency grid.
• Cheapest paid option : UnSoloMind. First plan at $9 per month.

The main tools at a glance

Dust 65/100

Dust helps company teams query internal knowledge and create agents connected to workplace tools. It supports choosing between language models, scheduling automated tasks and measuring how agents are used. Features: Query a company’s internal knowledge; Create agents connected to workplace tools; Choose between several language models. Entry price: €288 per year, with a free tier. Runs on: web browser, API, Slack, and browser extension. Data hosting: Several regions.

Glean 40/100

Glean helps company teams search workplace applications and receive answers citing internal documents. It respects information access rights, summarizes documents, creates agents for internal processes and finds people and their expertise. Features: Search across company applications; Answer with citations to internal documents; Respect information access rights. Runs on: web browser and API. Data hosting: Several regions.

UnSoloMind 38/100

UnSoloMind serves teams consulting knowledge contained in their documents. It creates a knowledge base, supports questions about imported files and provides a shared workspace with an editor. Features: Create a knowledge base from documents; Ask questions about imported files; Invite users to a shared workspace. Entry price: $9 per month, with a free tier. Runs on: web browser.

Refinder 33/100

Refinder searches across applications, answers questions from internal documents and summarizes retrieved information. It serves teams that want to create agents, run tasks from Slack and update data in connected tools. Features: Search for information across multiple applications; Answer questions using internal documents; Summarize retrieved information. Free tier available. Runs on: web browser and Slack.

The category in figures

Of the 4 tools in the category, 3 (75%) offer a free tier, 50% have a public API and 0 have a French interface. Too few tools publish a monthly price to compute a reliable median. 2 disclose where data is hosted, 0 of them in Europe or on device.

Also useful

These tools belong to another category but also cover this need:

• Microsoft 365 Copilot Microsoft 365 Copilot helps people working in Microsoft 365 applications write content and analyze work data.
• Read AI Read AI transcribes meetings, summarizes discussions and decisions and extracts action items. It serves users
• Pinecone Pinecone helps people build vector searches and document assistants. It stores and searches vectors, combines
• Agentset Agentset lets teams querying documents import and index them, search passages by meaning, and obtain answers w
• Qdrant Qdrant lets teams working with vector databases store and index vectors. It combines semantic and keyword sear
• Cohere Cohere lets businesses deploy assistants on their data and generate answers from documents. It also turns cont
• Elephas Elephas lets macOS users query a knowledge base built from their files and find passages supporting answers. I
• Fabric Fabric lets individuals and teams collect notes, links, and files in shared spaces. It provides search by mean
• GPT Researcher GPT Researcher lets users conducting research break down questions and consult web sources or local documents.
• Humata Humata lets users and teams ask questions about documents and summarize multiple files. It displays passages s
• Notion AI Notion AI helps teams write documents, summarize work pages, and find answers in connected tools. It also fill
• Cody Cody helps people developing software by answering questions about a code repository. It suggests code complet

Choosing well and avoiding pitfalls

Start with the applications and file formats your organisation actually uses. Test questions with known answers against recent, older and conflicting documents. Assess French language search when relevant, along with the usefulness of source references. Check synchronisation, deletion handling and enforcement of existing access permissions. Review workspace administration, available logs and terms for processing company data. Examine export options and what leaving the service would involve. Finally, compare billing conditions against your intended use, including users, connected sources and queries where applicable. A convincing demonstration should be followed by tests using your own authorised documents and representative staff permissions.

A fluent answer can combine conflicting versions, overlook an exception or rely on an outdated document. Open the sources and check their context and date. Incorrectly inherited permissions can expose information to people who should not see it. Test access using different staff profiles, including the excerpts shown in answers. Also distinguish a failed search from missing knowledge. Information may exist in a source that is disconnected, unsupported or not yet indexed by the service.

To compare with the cost of using an AI model directly, see the API price calculator.

Free or paid?

Depending on the service, free access or a demonstration may let you import documents and test questions within a restricted workspace. This can help you assess relevance. Paying may become useful when you need connected workplace applications, managed access or broader team use. Check file retention, removal options and the conditions that apply during and after the trial.

Tools in the category with a free tier: Dust, UnSoloMind, and Refinder.

For which jobs?

The profiles that use these tools most, based on the use cases documented by publishers: project managers, sales teams, customer support, developers, small business owners, and recruiters and HR.