OpenAI has announced plans to begin testing advertisements in ChatGPT’s free and Go tiers, marking a significant shift in how the popular AI chatbot is monetised as usage continues to surge globally.
The company disclosed the development in a post on X, noting that ad testing would begin “in the coming weeks” for users on the free tier and the newly introduced Go plan, priced at $8 per month.
OpenAI said the move is aimed at making AI tools more accessible to a wider audience while sustaining the cost of operating large-scale AI systems.
According to OpenAI, the introduction of ads will be guided by strict principles centred on user trust, transparency, and privacy.
“Responses in ChatGPT will not be influenced by ads,” the company said, adding that advertisements will always be clearly labelled and shown separately from AI-generated responses.
- OpenAI also emphasised that user conversations will remain private and will not be shared with advertisers.
- The company clarified that ads will not appear on its paid Pro, Business, and Enterprise tiers, ensuring an ad-free experience for professional and enterprise users.
Commenting on the decision, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the company recognises that many users want access to powerful AI tools but are unwilling or unable to pay subscription fees.
“It is clear to us that a lot of people want to use a lot of AI and don’t want to pay, so we are hopeful a business model like this can work,” Altman said.
He stressed that OpenAI would not accept payments to influence ChatGPT’s answers, describing that principle as “most important” to maintaining trust in the platform.
Altman also suggested that OpenAI wants ads on ChatGPT to be useful rather than intrusive, drawing a comparison with social media platforms.
“An example of ads I like are on Instagram, where I’ve found stuff I like that I otherwise never would have. We will try to make ads ever more useful to users,” he said.
The move comes as AI companies face rising infrastructure and compute costs amid explosive growth in demand for generative AI tools.
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