A Comparison of Three AI Tutoring Bots Communicating in isiZulu Using OpenAI's GPT-3.5-turbo, GPT-4-turbo, and GPT-4o

Documentation from OpenAI about their GPT-4o (Omni) API asserts that GPT-4o has “significant improvement on text in non-English languages”. Prior research by the author using earlier versions of GPT to create an isiZulu mathematics tutor showed some deficiencies with isiZulu comprehension and grammar using these earlier versions. This paper describes a comparison between three isiZulu AI chatBots which used three different versions of OpenAI's GPT API. A translator who is a member of the South African Translator's Institute and who also holds post graduate certificates in education was contracted to assist with the language and educational evaluation. This paper compares isiZulu AI chatBots which used GPT3.5 -turbo, GPT-4-turbo, and GPT-4o. The results show that GPT-4o does have substantial improvements over GPT-3.5-turbo and good improvements over GPT-4turbo. The results indicate that there could be business benefits for organisations which need to make information available to communities in isiZulu.