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OpenAI may soon carry ads in some ChatGPT versions to boost revenue amid rising expense
- IBJ Bureau
- Jan 18, 2026
OpenAI has said that it will start showing advertisements in ChatGPT to some US users. The proposal is aimed at ramping up efforts to generate revenue from the AI chatbot to fund the high costs of developing the technology.
The ads will be tested with users on the company’s free tier and the lower-priced Go plan that it is now expanding globally, OpenAI has said. They will show up in coming weeks and will be separate from the answers generated by ChatGPT.
Users on the more expensive Plus, Pro, Business and Enterprise tiers will not have ads. OpenAI also has added that advertising would not influence ChatGPT’s outputs and that user conversations would not be shared with marketers.
The move marks a major departure for the company that had so far relied on subscriptions. It shows the pressure OpenAI faces to increase revenue, as it spends heavily on data centres and prepares for a widely-anticipated initial public offer.
The money-losing start-up plans to spend more than $1 trillion on artificial intelligence infrastructure by 2030 but has not given details on how it plans to fund it.
Analysts have said that ads could unlock a significant revenue stream from ChatGPT’s 800 million weekly active users, but the move could irk some customers and hurt trust in the product.
If ads feel clumsy or opportunistic, users can easily switch to rival chatbots such as Google’s Gemini or Anthropic’s Claude, Emarketer analyst Jeremy Goldman notes.
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