Who AI recommends for HVAC in Dallas, and which sources it cites
We asked Perplexity and Gemini 10 questions a homeowner in Dallas would ask, three times each (60 answers, October 1, 2026). Baker Brothers Plumbing, Air & Electrical was named most: in 11 of 20 question checks. 51 HVAC companies were named on at least one check. The most-cited site was bestpickreports.com, in 48 of 60 answers. Asked each question once (October 1, 2026), ChatGPT named Rescue Air and Plumbing most (in 9 of 10 answers); that single run is counted separately from the numbers above.
By Matt Turley60 answers757 citations10 questionsPerplexity and GeminiChatGPT: 1 run per question, shown separately
A check is one question on one AI tool, asked three times. A heating and air company counts on a check when it was named in at least 2 of the three answers. Perplexity and Gemini together make 20 checks.
HVAC companies in Dallas named by majority, October 2026 (top 15 of 51)
#
Business
Checks named (of 20)
Perplexity (of 10)
Gemini (of 10)
Answers naming it (of 60)
1
Baker Brothers Plumbing, Air & Electrical
11
3
8
32
2
Rescue Air and Plumbing
10
1
9
26
3
Berkeys Plumbing, A/C & Electrical
9
6
3
31
4
Chill Brothers
8
0
8
23
5
Milestone Electric, A/C, & Plumbing
7
2
5
19
6
Texas AirZone LLC
6
3
3
18
7
Reliant Air Conditioning
6
3
3
16
8
Green Leaf Air
6
0
6
21
9
Airtron Dallas
5
3
2
14
10
Service Experts Dallas
5
5
0
17
11
Total Air & Plumbing
5
0
5
16
12
Aire Serv Dallas
4
3
1
12
13
Dallas Plumbing & Air Conditioning
4
0
4
18
14
Coolinary Arts Heating & Cooling
3
0
3
8
15
Medley Heating & Air Conditioning
3
0
3
8
Small sample, read it as a snapshot: 10 questions, two AI tools, three runs each, on October 1, 2026. A lead of one or two checks is within the run-to-run noise. This says nothing about the quality of anyone's work, and a heating and air company missing here was simply not named in most runs of these answers.
Table 2 · By AI tool
Perplexity and Gemini only partly agree
12 of the 51 HVAC companies named were named by both tools. The rest were named by one tool only.
Each AI tool on the same 10 questions
AI tool
Answers
Named by majority
Named most
Citations per answer
Perplexity sonar
30
28
Berkeys Plumbing, A/C & Electrical (6 of 10 questions, 60.0%)
18.0
Gemini gemini-2.5-flash
30
35
Rescue Air and Plumbing (9 of 10 questions, 90.0%)
7.2
ChatGPT gpt-4o
Asked once per question, so not comparable to the majority counts here. See the ChatGPT section.
serviceagent.aiDirectories and review sites18 30.0%
thumbtack.comDirectories and review sites15 25.0%
firstindallas.comBest-of lists and comparisons13 21.7%
airtron.comCompany websites12 20.0%
Answers citing each site, by AI tool
Site
Type
Perplexity (of 30)
Gemini (of 30)
bestpickreports.com
Directories and review sites
24
24
consumeraffairs.com
Directories and review sites
24
14
reddit.com
Reddit, forums, social and video
21
10
thechillbrothers.com
Best-of lists and comparisons
3
28
bakerbrothersplumbing.com
Company websites
15
14
forbes.com
News, docs and reference
21
8
aireserv.com
Company websites
24
4
berkeys.com
Company websites
18
7
reliantairconditioning.com
Company websites
15
8
expertise.com
Directories and review sites
21
0
serviceexperts.com
Company websites
18
1
serviceagent.ai
Directories and review sites
9
9
thumbtack.com
Directories and review sites
15
0
firstindallas.com
Best-of lists and comparisons
0
13
airtron.com
Company websites
12
0
Table 4 · ChatGPT, one run per question, collected October 1, 2026
What ChatGPT named, asked once per question
The same 10 questions went to ChatGPT one time each, not three. So a name counts here when it is written in that one answer. These counts are not in Tables 1 to 3, which stay the Perplexity and Gemini majority.
HVAC companies in Dallas named by ChatGPT, October 1, 2026 (top 15 of 42)
#
Business
ChatGPT answers naming it (of 10)
Share of answers
1
Rescue Air and Plumbing
9
90.0%
2
Texas AirZone LLC
8
80.0%
3
Berkeys Plumbing, A/C & Electrical
6
60.0%
4
Cody & Sons Plumbing, Heating & Air
6
60.0%
5
Quality 1 Energy Systems Heating & Air Conditioning
6
60.0%
6
Bacon Plumbing Heating Air Electric
5
50.0%
7
Coolinary Arts Heating & Cooling
5
50.0%
8
Willard Cooling, Heating, Plumbing, & Electrical
5
50.0%
9
Air Patrol
4
40.0%
10
Cozy - D Heating & A/C LLC
4
40.0%
11
Quigley Heating & Air Conditioning
4
40.0%
12
Serveway Heating & Air Conditioning
4
40.0%
13
Total Air & Heat Company
4
40.0%
14
Ellis AC & Furnace Repair
3
30.0%
15
On Time Experts
3
30.0%
ChatGPT66 citations · 6.6 per answer
50%36%
Company websites Directories and review sites Best-of lists and comparisons Reddit, forums, social and video News, docs and reference
Sites ChatGPT cited most, as answers citing the site at least once (of 10)
dfwprofessionals.comDirectories and review sites6 60.0%
expertise.comDirectories and review sites6 60.0%
consumeraffairs.comDirectories and review sites5 50.0%
dallasacrepairguide.comCompany websites5 50.0%
reddit.comReddit, forums, social and video4 40.0%
consumerbusinessreview.orgCompany websites3 30.0%
homeadvisor.comDirectories and review sites3 30.0%
airco.comCompany websites2 20.0%
dallastoprated.comDirectories and review sites2 20.0%
dirttrades.comCompany websites2 20.0%
One run per question is a thin sample: the names in an AI answer move from run to run, so a business named once here could be missing on the next ask. Read it as one look at ChatGPT on October 1, 2026, next to the steadier three-run numbers above.
What to do with it
If you run a heating and air company in Dallas
Your customers already ask these AI tools who to call. The answers above are what they get back. The HVAC companies named are the ones whose names show up on the sites the AI reads: the directories, review sites and best-of lists in Table 3, plus their own websites.
So start with the sites in Table 3. Make sure you are listed on the directories and review sites there, with your name written the same way everywhere. Find out who wrote the best-of lists and whether you belong on them. Then make your own site say plainly what you do, where you work and why people pick you, in the words a homeowner uses.
Do not judge from one answer. The names move from run to run, which is why every check here is three runs and a name only counts when it shows up in most of them.
This page covers the whole city. The AI Answer Check runs the same test on your own business: the questions your customers ask, three runs each on ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, whether you are named, who is named instead, and the three fixes worth the most. I read every report before it goes out.
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AI tools
Perplexity: Perplexity API, sonar model, live web search; cited URLs from the citations field. 30 answers.
Gemini: Google Vertex AI, gemini-2.5-flash with Google Search grounding; cited URLs from grounding chunks. 30 answers.
ChatGPT (separate, one run per question): OpenAI Responses API, gpt-4o with the web_search tool forced on; cited URLs from the answer annotations. 10 answers on October 1, 2026. Shown only in Table 4.
These are the APIs, not the consumer apps. Nobody was signed in and there was no system prompt: the question was the whole input. Each question went to each tool three times on October 1, 2026.
Who counts as named
A list of the businesses the answers recommend was built first by reading every answer. Then each answer was checked for each name in its text, with links and citation chips removed, so a cited link alone never counts. Spelling variants count as one name: curly or straight apostrophes, hyphen variants, and “&” or “and”. A name counts on a question and tool when it appears in at least 2 of the three runs. Directories, review sites and platforms are never ranked. ChatGPT was asked each question only once, so in Table 4 a name counts when it is in that one answer, with the same spelling rules. Those counts are never added to the majority numbers.
Sources
A citation is a URL the API itself returns as a source (Perplexity's citations list, Gemini's grounding sources resolved from Google's redirect links, and for ChatGPT the URLs in the answer annotations). Each site counts once per answer. Source types come from a written rulebook, not a person reading every page, so some pages land in the wrong group, mostly between company sites, blogs and lists.