Quark, the artificial intelligence (AI) application from Alibaba Group, has come up with an all-new 'deep search' function. It answers complex queries by users by combining the reasoning capabilities of its AI models and online search.
The update is available across different platforms, including smartphones and PCs, according to the South China Morning Post.
This comes after Quark clocked nearly 150 million monthly active users (MAUs) around the world to emerge as the most popular AI application in China in March 2025. It left behind ByteDance's Doubao as well as DeepSeek by a huge margin. They could only manage to get around 100 million and 77 million users, respectively.
Quark claims its AI application is different from other conventional search engines that mainly rely on keywords.
It can deliver "accurate" responses to user queries, as "deep search" feature takes maximum advantage of the Qwen AI models by Alibaba.
A few months ago, the group announced revamping the web-search and cloud storage tool into the AI assistant -- a move that allowed the company to strengthen its footing in the AI industry.
Zhang Fan, head of Quark's search business, said they will continue to enhance the deep search function and "focus on user needs" in its bid to emerge as an "all-around AI assistant," South China Morning Post reported.
To use the 'deep search' function, you can ask a question in the mobile app. It will then analyse the user query and do an online search in a phased manner. It adjusts and refines its reasoning process by utilising the search results to offer a response to the user.
Quark is not the first in the country to combine AI reasoning with online search. Similar features were earlier announced by the Kimi chatbot from Moonshot AI.
This comes at a time when the internet search business worldwide is believed to be grappling with various challenges from various AI tools, the report stated.
A few days ago, Apple's senior vice-president Eddie Cue said that Google searches on iPhone's Safari browser had fallen for the first time last month, as per The Verge.
Speaking at Google's antitrust trial on Wednesday, Mr Cue noted this "never happened in 22 years".
The decline in searches was linked by the Apple official to the growing use of artificial intelligence.
As per reports, Apple receives nearly $20 billion from Google to make its search engine the default in Safari.
