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Reviewed and published by trentmaziarz, March 24, 2026. Discovered and drafted by our automated research pipeline.
OpenAI deployed contextual ads in ChatGPT starting February 9, 2026, showing sponsored content to free-tier users based on the topics of their current conversation.
Details
Ads appear as labeled, tinted boxes at the bottom of ChatGPT responses for users on the Free and Go tiers; paid Plus, Team, and Enterprise users do not see ads. The ad matching system uses the current chat thread content, general location, and language — not behavioral tracking across the web. A self-serve Ads Manager launched in May 2026, allowing businesses to run campaigns with CPC and CPM bidding. The pilot expanded to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand in April 2026.
Products affected
ChatGPT (Free and Go tiers)
Sources & Evidence
News Article
Company Disclosure
Cite this record
Trace Foundation. (2026). OpenAI: OpenAI deployed contextual ads in ChatGPT starting February 9, 2026, showing sponsored content to free-tier users based on the topics of their current conversation (data as of 2026-08-03) [Data set record]. AI Trace. https://www.aitrace.org/r/practice/c72657de-53ec-40c6-943e-7dee9879b4b8. Accessed October 13, 2026.
- Stable link
- https://www.aitrace.org/r/practice/c72657de-53ec-40c6-943e-7dee9879b4b8
- Data as of
- August 3, 2026
- Last verified
- April 10, 2026
Other practices by OpenAI
Creative GenOpenAI offered Sora, an AI video generation tool that produced short video clips from text prompts or uploaded images, to ChatGPT Plus and Pro subscribers starting December 2024; the product was discontinued in a phased shutdown, with the app and web closing on April 26, 2026 and the API scheduled to close on September 24, 2026. OpenAI announced the discontinuation on March 24, 2026, with reporting pointing to high compute costs and a strategic shift toward coding and enterprise products. A three-year licensing deal signed in December 2025 with The Walt Disney Company, under which Disney had committed a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, lapsed when the product shut down before the partnership terms were executed.OtherOpenAI deployed ChatGPT for US government and defense use through its OpenAI for Government platform, including a $200 million Pentagon contract and deployment on the DoD's GenAI.mil platform for approximately 3 million personnel.OtherOpenAI announced a collaboration agreement with Figure AI, a humanoid robotics company, through its startup fund in February 2024, supporting the integration of OpenAI's AI models into physical robots.
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