Ask ChatGPT in Arabic and it searches in English

On 24 September Perplexity got the same question from us twice, six seconds apart. Once in English, the way an expat in Dubai Marina might type it. Once in Gulf Arabic, the way a buyer in Al Ain might say it into a phone.

The English version was "which luxury developer in UAE offers best post-handover payment plans". The answer opened with this.

"For the longest and most flexible post-handover terms, Samana appears strongest; for a luxury brand, Sobha Realty is a compelling option."

The Arabic version was «منو أفضل مطور عقاري فاخر في الإمارات يقدم خطط دفع بعد التسليم؟». Same platform, same afternoon, a different developer in first place.

«فـ داماك (DAMAC) غالبًا أبرز خيار تبدأ به»

It ended with «الخلاصة: داماك هي الأقرب لطلبك».

We were ready to write the obvious post about that. Then we measured how much these answers move when you simply ask again in the same language, and we had to start over.

We are Pharos, a small team in the UAE. We track what ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Mode, Perplexity and Claude say about businesses, and we keep every answer. For this post we went back through the stored answers for Gulf businesses we have audited, from developers and restaurants to cleaners and home-services apps. Each number below comes with its sample and dates. Some samples are small, and we say which.

ChatGPT reads English and answers in Arabic

When ChatGPT needs current information, it searches the web first and writes from what it finds. We record those searches.

On 18 October, for a home-services company we track, ChatGPT was asked «ما أفضل شركات تنظيف المنازل الموثوقة في الشارقة؟». It searched for this.

best trusted home cleaning companies Sharjah UAE reviews services

There is no Arabic in it. The answer that came back was entirely in Arabic and read naturally, opening with «إذا كنت تبحث عن شركة تنظيف منازل موثوقة في الشارقة».

We checked whether this was a fluke. Between 13 and 19 October we had 33 questions written purely in Arabic, for four businesses, and ChatGPT searched before answering every one. That made 34 answers, because one question was asked twice. All 34 searches were in English, and all 34 answers were in Arabic. Counting every Arabic question about these businesses that week, including those with an English word mixed in, it was 88 of 89.

The dialect goes too. «أبي أحجز شركة تنظيف منازل بالساعة تجيب معها مواد التنظيف في دبي اليوم؟» is how people in Dubai really ask for a cleaner who brings the supplies. ChatGPT searched "Dubai hourly home cleaning supplies included book today".

The city survives the trip. In the 39 answers that week where the Arabic question named an emirate, ChatGPT kept the emirate in its English search every time. Hold on to that detail, because it is the most useful thing in this post.

Claude does something else. On the same questions it searched purely in English 9 times out of 34 and in Arabic the rest of the time.

For an owner, the consequence is awkward. A customer who asks ChatGPT about your service in Arabic gets an Arabic answer built from English pages. If your English pages are thin, the Arabic site you paid a translator for may never be read.

Who reads Arabic sources

For those same pure-Arabic questions, we counted how many of the cited pages had an Arabic title.

Perplexity, 68% (231 of 340). Claude, 66%. Gemini, 56%. ChatGPT, 26%. Google AI Mode, 23% (17 of 74).

Ask in English and Arabic sources all but vanish. Over the same week there were 7 Arabic-titled pages among 2,873 citations.

A title is a rough guide to a page's language, and these are around 30 answers per platform. The gap is still too wide to ignore. ChatGPT and Google AI Mode are, we think, where most people in the Gulf will try first, and those two mostly cited English pages.

The Arabic pages that do get cited

Most owners would guess the wrong ones.

We took 241 answers to Arabic questions about UAE restaurants, from three restaurant brands, between 21 September and 13 October. Exactly 100 of them cited Bayut or Property Finder.

The property portals, yes. Both run Arabic blogs (Bayut's is MyBayut, «ماي بيوت») that publish roundups such as «مطاعم اماراتية في دبي» and «مطاعم العين الشعبية». Bayut's Arabic pages appeared in 60 answers and Property Finder's in 52. The Arabic edition of Tripadvisor appeared in 40.

Outside restaurants, the Arabic sources that kept recurring for the Gulf businesses we track were talabat, Visit Dubai, Emarat Al Youm, Al Ain News and the government portal u.ae.

Go back to the Sharjah cleaning question. Perplexity answered it 39 seconds before ChatGPT did. All ten of its sources had Arabic titles, including several small cleaning companies' own Arabic pages. ChatGPT cited eight pages, two of them Arabic. The answers shared one company, Urban Company.

They also shared one article, a MyBayut piece on cleaning companies in Sharjah. Our records show the two platforms saw it under different titles, each naming two companies. ChatGPT named the two in its version, Cleantel and Final Touch. Perplexity named the two in its version, «كلين إت» and «الورق الأبيض». So two of the five companies on each platform's list were the two in the title of one Arabic article on a property website.

Abu Dhabi is a different market to the AI

Language changes the sources. The emirate changes the names.

For a home-services marketplace, we track ten everyday questions in Gulf Arabic, each asked once for Abu Dhabi and once for Dubai, on five platforms, on the same day. The wording is identical apart from the city. They are the questions people really ask. An AC technician who can come today. Movers who are licensed and insure against breakage.

Where both answers named a business, the first one matched in only 8 of 47 pairs. In 32 of 50, the Abu Dhabi and Dubai answers had no business in common.

Some of that is noise, so we compared it with asking the same question again for the same city. A few days later, the first name stays the same 44% of the time. Later the same day, 42%. Switching the city took it to 17%.

The marketplace works across the country. It was named in 13 of the Dubai answers and 6 of the Abu Dhabi ones.

For restaurants this is expected. Ask for a popular Emirati place for a family lunch in Dubai, then in Sharjah, and the first restaurant named changes. It did in all ten of our pairs. The case to worry about is the business that serves every emirate and assumes a good showing in Dubai covers the rest. In our data it did not carry over to Abu Dhabi, and we have no reason to think Ajman is different.

"Visible in English, missing in Arabic"

You will hear this a lot. Our data backs a weaker version of it.

Take the Dubai developer from the opening. Over twelve questions that did not name it, on five platforms, it was named in both languages 18 times, in Arabic only 9 times and in English only 6 times. In 15 of the 33 cases where it appeared, it appeared in one language. The gap ran both ways, and Arabic came out slightly ahead.

Now the awkward part. Across eight UAE businesses, the same question in the same language, run twice a few days apart, flipped between naming the business and not naming it 47% of the time. Arabic and English lists of names overlapped by about 30%. Asking twice in one language overlapped about as much.

So we treat a single screenshot as a rumour. One Arabic check that leaves you out proves little, and one that names you proves just as little. Repeated runs are what count. The source language is the steady part. It did not budge across 34 answers.

What the numbers change for a Gulf business

We have written the full how-to elsewhere. Our guide to Arabic and English AI answers covers writing Arabic pages and settling your Arabic name, and what AI platforms cite in the region covers directories and delivery apps. The measurements above add four things to that list.

Your English pages answer Arabic questions too. On ChatGPT and Google AI Mode, about three in four pages cited for Arabic questions were not Arabic. ChatGPT's English search keeps the city, so those pages need the emirate and the area in the title and the first sentence. A single "UAE" page will lose to the cleaner whose page says Al Nahda, Sharjah.

Each emirate is its own result. Check Abu Dhabi and Sharjah on their own, even when Dubai looks fine.

If you run a restaurant, the Arabic roundups on MyBayut and the Property Finder blog are worth more of your time than you would expect. They were cited in 41% of the Arabic restaurant answers we looked at.

Never act on one run. Ask your most valuable questions in both languages, for each emirate you serve, three times over a week, logged out. Act on what repeats.

You can start tonight with one question. Ask ChatGPT in Arabic for the best of what you sell in Sharjah, ask again for Abu Dhabi, and look at whose pages it cited.

If you would rather we ran it, the free audit at heypharos.com works in Arabic and in English. Every Pharos plan tracks both languages, in up to eight locations.