Grok 4 is a BEAST (if you know how to use it)

Key Concepts

Grok 4, Prompt Engineering, 3D Animation (3JS, WebGL), Interactive Visualizations, Math Problem Solving (Olympiad Level), Visual Puzzles (ARC AGI Benchmark), Multimodal AI, AI Model Benchmarks, Hallucination, Performance Comparison (Grok 4 vs. Gemini 2.5 Pro, Claude Opus, etc.), AI Model Pricing, XAI, Grok 4 Heavy, Financial Analysis, Voice Assistant, Waifu Companion.

3D Animation and Interactive Visualizations with Grok 4

• Initial Prompting Failures: The video demonstrates that Grok 4 requires specific and detailed prompting to achieve desired results. A general prompt for an "insane interactive visualizer" using 3JS resulted in non-functional code with errors (e.g., "Three is not defined").
• Effective Prompt Engineering: The key to successful Grok 4 usage lies in detailed prompt engineering. This involves:
  • Defining the AI's Role: Specifying Grok's role as a "senior 3D graphics programmer with extensive experience in WebGL and 3JS."
  • Detailed Instructions: Providing explicit instructions on the desired output, such as "generate a complete self-contained HTML file that renders a photorealistic and interactive 3D simulation."
  • Keyword Emphasis: Using keywords to encourage visually compelling animations.
  • Explicit Library Imports: Specifying the exact libraries and packages to use (e.g., 3JS, orbit controls) and providing the import script.
• Asteroid Impact Simulation: Using a well-engineered prompt, Grok 4 successfully created an interactive 3D simulation of an asteroid impact on Earth, including realistic textures and user-adjustable settings (size, speed). Gemini 2.5 Pro's attempt resulted in a less realistic animation without an explosion.
• Galton Board Simulation: Grok 4 generated a realistic Galton board simulation using matter.js for physics. A follow-up prompt was used to add edges to the board, improving the simulation's realism.
• Morphing Particle Visualizer: Grok 4 created an interactive morphing particle visualizer capable of transforming into five different nonlinear dynamics (Rosler, Isawa, Thomas, Halverson, etc.). This involved using add-on packages for 3JS (orbit controls, effect composer, render pass, unreal bloom pass). Gemini 2.5 Pro failed to produce a comparable result, encountering errors and generating simpler shapes.
• Helix, Lattice, Galaxy, Neural Network Visualizer: Another example showcased Grok 4's ability to create a colorful and visually appealing visualizer that morphed between helixes, lattices, galaxies, neural networks, and a torus.

Interactive Map Creation

• USA Map with Multiple Layers: Grok 4 was tasked with creating an interactive map of the USA with toggles for layers like water, natural areas, urban areas, highways, and population density, using leaflet.js and existing geoJSON/topoJSON data.
• Iterative Refinement: The initial result had issues with several layers (lakes, rivers, natural areas, highways). A follow-up prompt requesting correction of these layers led to Grok 4 successfully adding the lakes and natural areas layers.
• Comparison with Gemini 2.5 Pro: Gemini 2.5 Pro's attempt resulted in a map with toggleable layers, but none of the layers were actually applied to the map.

Black Hole Visualizer

• Interactive Black Hole Visualization: Grok 4 created an interactive black hole visualizer in a standalone HTML file using specified 3JS packages. The animation was controlled by mouse movement.
• Comparison with Gemini 2.5 Pro: Gemini 2.5 Pro's attempt resulted in a less convincing visualization without the suction effect.

Financial Analysis

• PDF Analysis and Summarization: Grok 4 was able to analyze and summarize Q4 earnings reports from Nvidia, Google, and Amazon, extracting key metrics and generating a financial analysis report with charts and visuals.
• Data Verification: The extracted data (e.g., Nvidia's 126% year-over-year growth) was verified against the original reports.
• 12-Month Forecast: Grok 4 generated a 12-month forecast, but it was noted that the forecast appeared to be a simple linear extrapolation.

Math Problem Solving

• Olympiad-Level Math Question: Grok 4 successfully solved a challenging math problem from the International Math Olympiad 2022 shortlisted problems. The problem involved finding the smallest number of non-empty piles obtainable from n piles of pebbles.
• Correct Answer: Grok 4 correctly determined that the answer is one if n is a power of two and two otherwise.

Visual Puzzle Solving

• ARC AGI Benchmark: Grok 4 was able to solve a visual puzzle from the ARC AGI benchmark, which involves identifying patterns in sequences of images.
• Correct Answer: Grok 4 correctly identified the answer as "D."

Grok 4 Specifications and Performance

• Multimodal Model: Grok 4 is a multimodal model capable of processing images and PDFs.
• Future Developments: XAI is planning to release a video generator and a coding-specific version of Grok 4.
• Grok 4 vs. Grok 4 Heavy: Grok 4 Heavy is a more powerful version of Grok 4 that uses multiple agents working in parallel. It is designed for complex reasoning tasks in fields like medicine and research.
• Pricing: Grok 4 costs $30 per month, while Grok 4 Heavy costs $300 per month.
• Voice Assistant: Grok 4 has a voice assistant with realistic voice and customizable roles (assistant, therapist, storyteller, etc.).
• Waifu Companion: XAI released a waifu companion feature in the Grok app (currently only on iPhone).
• Benchmarks:
  • GPQA: Grok 4 and Grok 4 Heavy outperform other models on graduate-level science questions.
  • Competitive Coding: Grok 4 outperforms other models in competitive coding benchmarks.
  • Olympiad Math Proofs: Grok 4 Heavy significantly outperforms other models in Olympiad math proofs.
  • ARC AGI: Grok 4 significantly outperforms other models on the ARC AGI benchmark, demonstrating its ability to learn new patterns.
  • Artificial Analysis Leaderboard: Grok 4 is ranked number one with an intelligence index of 73.
  • Livebench by Abacus AI: Grok 4 is ranked number four, scoring highest in reasoning and mathematics but lower in agentic coding and language.
  • Fiction Livebench: Grok 4 performs well in processing and understanding long texts.
  • Hallucination Leaderboard by Victa: Grok 4 hallucinates 4.88% of the time, which is higher than some other models.
  • Humanity's Last Exam: Grok 4 performs well on obscure and specialized subjects, especially with tools like Python and Internet access.

Conclusion

Grok 4 is a highly capable AI model that excels in complex reasoning tasks, coding, math, and visual problem-solving. Effective prompt engineering is crucial to maximizing its potential. While Grok 4 is not perfect (hallucinations can occur), its performance across various benchmarks positions it as a leading AI model. XAI's rapid development and deployment of Grok 4 and its associated infrastructure are impressive achievements.