OpenAI announced that it has begun testing ads inside ChatGPT in the U.S. for users on its free subscription tiers and the new $8/month “ChatGPT Go” plan. This development marks the company's shift away from its ad-free model to a new monetisation strategy. Ads are part of OpenAI’s strategy to diversify revenue beyond subscriptions and support the costs of huge AI infrastructure.
Notably, OpenAI has tens of millions of weekly users, but most of them are free users. Therefore, the company is using ads to sustain free, low-cost access and support the platform improvements. The rollout is in a testing phase, using the means to gather data on performance and user feedback before expanding further.
According to the company’s official statement and reporting, paid users, including its "Education", "Enterprise", "Business", "Pro", and "Plus" users, will not be served ads while using any of the AI models. The ads will appear below chat responses, not mixed into the generated text, and they'll be clearly labelled as “Sponsored” and visually separated from ChatGPT’s answers.
It's also important to note that the ads will match the topic of your conversations and your past interactions with external ads or chats. For example, users planning a vacation might see ads for hotels, travel insurance, or flight deals, the company says.
Meanwhile, OpenAI also gives users control of the ads they see. While users can dismiss ads, provide feedback, and manage ad personalisation, the company says it does not sell individual chat content or private data to advertisers. "Advertisers do not receive access to individual conversations or personal information, only anonymised, aggregated metrics such as impressions and engagement rates," the company cited.
In addition to that, ads won’t be shown to users under 18 and will not appear alongside content related to sensitive or regulated areas such as healthcare, political issues, or mental well-being. Users will also have the option to review their past interactions with ads and delete that information whenever they choose.
