Perplexity is launching a new revenue-share model for publishers

Media companies will get paid out of a $42.5 million pool when their articles are used by Perplexity’s web browser

In announcing Comet Plus, Perplexity said: "Comet Plus is the first compensation model that allocates revenue to our partners based on three types of internet traffic: human visits, search citations and agent actions. Publishers should settle for nothing less. The revenue allocation recognizes the reality that users now choose how they want to consume information: browsing manually, asking for AI-generated answers or deploying agents for complex tasks. Publishers deserve compensation that matches this new reality." READ MORE

Posted Monday, August 25, 2025 4:44 pm

Alexandra Bruell | The Wall Street Journal

Perplexity will pay publishers for news articles that the artificial-intelligence company uses to answer queries.

The artificial-intelligence startup expects to pay publishers from a $42.5 million revenue pool initially, and to increase that amount over time, Perplexity said Monday.

Perplexity plans to distribute money when its AI assistant or search engine uses a news article to fulfill a task or answer a search request.

Its payments to publishers will come out of the subscription revenue generated by a new news service, called Comet Plus, that Perplexity plans to roll out widely this fall.