Perplexity

Perplexity functions answer with live web search and return citations such as [1] inline. They use Perplexity’s Agent API, which replaced the retired Sonar chat models. Instead of a model name you choose an effort level. Once licensed you need a key from perplexity.ai/settings/api, added via Set API Keys → Insert Perplexity API Key.

Functions

Function	Effort	Good for
=PPLX(prompt, [system_prompt], [ignore_cache])	fast	quick facts: prices, names, dates
=PPLX_PRO(prompt, [system_prompt], [ignore_cache])	low	light multi-step research
=PPLX_REASONING(prompt, [system_prompt], [ignore_cache])	medium	multi-hop research across several searches
=PPLX_AGENT(prompt, [system_prompt], [effort], [ignore_cache])	your choice	anything, including high and xhigh

=PERPLEXITY(), =PERPLEXITY_PRO() and =PERPLEXITY_REASONING() are aliases of the first three.

Parameters

• prompt (required): the question.
• system_prompt (optional): instructions for the answer. Defaults to “Be precise and concise.” Pass "" to skip it when you need a later argument.
• effort (=PPLX_AGENT() only, optional): fast, low, medium, high or xhigh. Higher effort runs more search rounds, takes longer and costs more. Old Sonar model names are accepted and mapped: sonar → fast, sonar-pro → low, sonar-reasoning and sonar-reasoning-pro → medium, sonar-deep-research → high.
• ignore_cache (optional): TRUE forces a fresh search. See Caching.

Examples

=PPLX("Who is the CEO of " & A2 & "? Name only.")
=PPLX("Current price of Bitcoin in USD", "Reply with the number only")
=PPLX_PRO("Summarize the latest funding round of " & A2)
=PPLX_REASONING("Compare the pricing models of " & A2 & " and " & B2)
=PPLX_AGENT("Write a market overview of " & A2, "", "high")
=PPLX("Today's top AI news", "", TRUE)

Pair with EXTRACT_INFO

Perplexity answers are prose with citations. To get a clean value, extract it: =EXTRACT_INFO(C2, "price in USD", "number").

Errors

Cell shows	Meaning
Error: Free trial for Perplexity used up (10/10) ...	Activate your license and add your own key.
Error: Perplexity API key not set ...	Add your key via Set API Keys → Insert Perplexity API Key.
Error in calling Perplexity API: Perplexity API returned 401 ...	The key was rejected. Re-copy it from Perplexity.
... returned 429 ...	Rate limit or no credit on your Perplexity account.
No prompt provided	The prompt cell is empty.