Within two weeks of launching the Facebook analytics service, 400,000 users had used it. Downloadable query results are behind a pay wall but summaries are accessible to free accounts.
Wolfram Alpha is used to power some searches in the Microsoft Bing and DuckDuckGo search engines. For factual question answering, it is also queried by Apple's Siri, Samsung's S Voice, as well as Dexetra's speech recognition software for the Android platform, Iris, and the voice control software on BlackBerry 10.
Launch preparations began on May 15, 2009 at 7 pm CDT and were broadcast live on Justin.tv. The plan was to publicly launch the service a few hours later, with expected issues due to extreme load. The service was officially launched on May 18, 2009.
On December 3, 2009, an iPhone app was introduced. Some users considered the initial $50 price of the iOS app unnecessarily high, since the same features could be freely accessed by using a web browser instead. They also complained about the simultaneous removal of the mobile formatting option for the site. Wolfram responded by lowering the price to $2, offering a refund to existing customers and re-instating the mobile site.
On October 6, 2010 an Android version of the app was released and it is now available for Kindle Fire and Nook. (The Nook version is not available outside the US). A further 71 apps are available which use the Wolfram Alpha engine for specialized tasks.
Wolfram Alpha Pro
On February 8, 2012, Wolfram Alpha Pro was released, offering users additional features for a monthly subscription fee. A key feature is the ability to upload many common file types and data—including raw tabular data, images, audio, XML, and dozens of specialized scientific, medical, and mathematical formats—for automatic analysis. Other features include an extended keyboard, interactivity with CDF, data downloads, in-depth step by step solution, the ability to customize and save graphical and tabular results and extra computation time.
Along with new premium features, Wolfram Alpha Pro has led to some changes in the free version of the site:
- An increase in advertisements on the free site.
- Text and PDF export options now require the user to set up a free account even though they existed before the introduction of Wolfram Alpha accounts.
- The option to request extra time for a long calculation used to be free but is now only available to subscribers.
- Step-by-Step limited to 3 for free users (previously uncapped)(no longer available).
InfoWorld published an article warning readers of the potential implications of giving an automated website proprietary rights to the data it generates. Free software advocate Richard Stallman also opposes the idea of recognizing the site as a copyright holder and suspects that Wolfram would not be able to make this case under existing copyright law.
- Wolfram Alpha About page
- "Wolframalpha.com Site Info". Alexa Internet. Retrieved 2015-03-31.
- The Wolfram|Alpha Launch Team (May 8, 2009). "So Much for A Quiet Launch". Wolfram|Alpha Blog. Wolfram Alpha. Retrieved 2013-02-09.
- The Wolfram|Alpha Launch Team (May 12, 2009). "Going Live—and Webcasting It". Wolfram|Alpha Blog. Wolfram Alpha. Retrieved 2013-02-09.
- Bobbie Johnson (May 21, 2009). "Where does Wolfram Alpha get its information?". The Guardian. Retrieved 2013-03-08.
- "About Wolfram|Alpha: Making the World's Knowledge Computable". wolframalpha.com. Retrieved 2015-11-25.
- Johnson, Bobbie (March 9, 2009). "British search engine 'could rival Google'". The Guardian. UK: Guardian News and Media. Retrieved 2013-02-09.
- Dillet, Romain (September 7, 2012). "Wolfram Alpha Makes CrunchBase Data Computable Just In Time For Disrupt SF". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2013-02-09.
- Golson, Jordan (December 16, 2011). "Wolfram Delivers Siri-Enabled Shopping Results From Best Buy". MacRumors. Retrieved 2013-02-09.
- Barylick, Chris (November 19, 2011). "Wolfram Alpha search engine now tracks flight paths, trajectory information". Engadget. Retrieved 2013-02-09.
- "Data in Wolfram|Alpha". Wolfram Alpha. Retrieved 4 August 