What is ChatGPT? The AI chatbot explained

Like other large language models, ChatGPT can sometimes “hallucinate,” a term used to describe the tendency for such models to respond with inaccurate or misleading information. Buzzfeed data scientist Max Woolf said that ChatGPT had passed the Turing test in December 2022, but some experts claim that ChatGPT did not pass a true Turing test because in ordinary usage ChatGPT often states that it is a language model. The American media company Buzzfeed announced that it would use OpenAI tools, such as ChatGPT, to produce content, such as quizzes, that would be personalized for readers. Language models produce text based on the probability for a word to occur based on previous words in the sequence. Many individuals use ChatGPT and comparable large language models mental health and emotional support. As of 2023, there were several pending U.S. lawsuits challenging the use of copyrighted data to train AI models, with defendants arguing that this falls under fair use.
As of late 2025, GPT-5 Auto is the default model for most conversations. You can try ChatGPT without an account in many regions, but signing in unlocks advanced features like saved chat history, conversation sharing, custom instructions, and higher usage limits. There are also desktop apps for Windows and macOS that add systemwide shortcuts for quickly launching ChatGPT and sharing your screen, files, or screenshots directly in a chat. In my experience, the web version offers the fullest range of features available. There’s still a free version of ChatGPT, but the Plus and Pro plans can do faster responses and provide access to the latest tools.

Regional responses

A new report from app analytics firm Appfigures found that over half of ChatGPT’s mobile users are under age 25, with users between ages 50 and 64 making up the second largest age demographic. OpenAI says it collects user posts from the subreddit and asks its AI models to write replies, in a closed environment, that would change the Reddit user’s mind on a subject. OpenAI used the subreddit r/ChangeMyView to measure the persuasive abilities of its AI reasoning models.

OpenAI adopts Anthropic’s standard for linking AI models with data

  • What started as a tool to supercharge productivity through writing essays and code with short text prompts has evolved into a behemoth with 300 million weekly active users.
  • The potential benefits include enhancing personalized learning, improving student productivity, assisting with brainstorming, summarization, and supporting language literacy skills.
  • Noam Brown, who heads AI reasoning research at OpenAI, thinks that certain types of AI models for “reasoning” could have been developed 20 years ago if researchers had understood the correct approach and algorithms.
  • It continues by saying “The model can understand and respond to user input in a way that mimics human conversation, allowing for more natural and engaging interactions.
  • OpenAI also said Mark Chen would step into the expanded role of chief research officer, and Julia Villagra will take on the role of chief people officer.
  • In December 2024, OpenAI launched a new feature allowing users to call ChatGPT with a telephone for up to 15 minutes per month for free.
  • In November 2023, OpenAI released GPT Builder a tool for users to customize ChatGPT’s behavior for a specific use case.

Reliance has proposed selling OpenAI’s models to businesses in India through an application programming interface (API) so they can incorporate AI into their operations. However, the company has now “evolved” its approach, as stated in a blog post published by Joanne Jang, the lead for OpenAI’s model behavior. OpeanAI intends to release its “first” open language model since GPT-2 “in the coming months.” The company plans to host developer events to gather feedback and eventually showcase prototypes of the model. It looks like OpenAI is working on a watermarking feature for images generated using GPT-4o. OpenAI may launch several new AI models, including GPT-4.1, soon, The Verge reported, citing anonymous sources.
OpenAI charges $150 for every million tokens (about 750,000 words) input into the model and $600 for every million tokens the model produces. OpenAI says its o1-pro uses more computing than its o1 “reasoning” AI model to deliver “consistently better responses.” It’s only accessible to select developers who have spent at least $5 on OpenAI API services. The company claims they are improved versions of what was already there and that they hallucinate less.

Who uses ChatGPT?

Geoffrey Hinton, one of the “fathers of AI”, voiced concerns that future AI systems may surpass human intelligence. In 2025, Israel signed a $6M contract with the US based firm Clock Tower X that aimed to influence ChatGPT, Gemini and Grok by taking advantage of retrieval-augmented generation. In October 2025, OpenAI banned accounts suspected to be linked to the Chinese government for violating the company’s national security policy. OpenAI said it has taken steps to effectively clarify and address the issues raised; an age verification tool was implemented to ensure users are at least 13 years old. In late March 2023, the Italian data protection authority banned ChatGPT in Italy and opened an investigation. ChatGPT has never been publicly available in China because OpenAI prevented Chinese users from accessing their site.
OpenAI says enterprise use of its AI tools has surged, with ChatGPT message volume up 8x since late 2024 and workers saving up to an hour a day. Disney is putting $1 billion into OpenAI as a way to dive into AI, letting users on Sora create videos using over 200 Disney characters, at least for the first year exclusively. The update comes as OpenAI races to keep up with Google’s Gemini and Nano Banana Pro in AI image generation. OpenAI has released GPT Image 1.5, a new version of ChatGPT Images that’s faster and better at following instructions and making precise edits. This makes it one of the fastest-growing apps in terms of revenue, outpacing rivals like TikTok, Disney+, and HBO Max. OpenAI also faced its share of internal drama, including the notable exits of high-level execs like co-founder and longtime chief scientist Ilya Sutskever and CTO Mira Murati.

  • In 2025, Israel signed a $6M contract with the US based firm Clock Tower X that aimed to influence ChatGPT, Gemini and Grok by taking advantage of retrieval-augmented generation.
  • In July 2025, OpenAI released ChatGPT agent, an AI agent that can perform multi-step tasks.
  • OpenAI has released two new reasoning models, o3 and o4 mini, just two days after launching GPT-4.1.
  • The private equity company that owns CNET, Red Ventures, was accused of using ChatGPT for SEO farming, even if the information was incorrect.
  • OpenAI introduced o3 in December, stating that the model could solve approximately 25% of questions on FrontierMath, a difficult math problem set.

Brad Lightcap, OpenAI’s chief operating officer, will lead the company’s global expansion and manage corporate partnerships as CEO Sam Altman shifts his focus to research and products, according to a blog post from OpenAI. The protocol is currently available in the Agents SDK, and support for the ChatGPT desktop app and Responses API will be coming soon, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said. The organization originally estimated that the best-performing configuration of o3 it tested, o3 high, would cost approximately $3,000 to address a single problem. The Arc Prize Foundation, which develops the AI benchmark tool ARC-AGI, has updated the estimated computing costs for OpenAI’s o3 “reasoning” model managed by ARC-AGI. OpenAI plans to sunset GPT-4, an AI model introduced more than two years ago, and replace it with GPT-4o, the current default model, per changelog.

ChatGPT has upgraded its image-generation feature

More and more tech companies and search engines are utilizing the chatbot to automate text or quickly answer user questions/concerns. Both the free version of ChatGPT and the paid ChatGPT Plus are regularly updated with new GPT models. ChatGPT is a general-purpose chatbot that uses artificial intelligence to generate text after a user enters a prompt, developed by tech startup OpenAI.
After introducing a data residency program in Europe in February, OpenAI has now launched a similar program in Asian countries including India, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. OpenAI said in a post on X that it has launched its GPT-4.1 and GPT4.1 mini AI models in ChagGPT. The feature enables ChatGPT to retrieve information across users’ own services to answer their questions.
While OpenAI has a similar deleted data retention policy for ChatGPT, the retention period for ChatGPT is only 30 days, which foxygold casino is 60 days shorter than Operator’s. OpenAI launched ChatGPT Gov designed to provide U.S. government agencies an additional way to access the tech. OpenAI first previewed the model in December alongside a more capable system called o3. OpenAI announced a new AI “agent” called deep research that’s designed to help people conduct in-depth, complex research using ChatGPT. To use ChatGPT in any form through the native mobile app, you will still need to be logged in. In response to pressure from rivals like DeepSeek, OpenAI is changing the way its o3-mini model communicates its step-by-step “thought” process.
Personal data has to be accurate,” said Joakim Söderberg, data protection lawyer at Noyb, in a statement. Meta also plans to bolster its presence in India by constructing a large 3GW data center in Jamnagar, Gujarat. Users on ChatGPT’s free tier can now access the new version of Advanced Voice Mode, while paying users will receive answers that are “more direct, engaging, concise, specific, and creative,” a spokesperson from OpenAI told TechCrunch. The update enables real-time conversations, and the AI assistant is said to be more personable and interrupts users less often. OpenAI has updated its AI voice assistant with improved chatting capabilities, according to a video posted on Monday (March 24) to the company’s official media channels. OpenAI also said Mark Chen would step into the expanded role of chief research officer, and Julia Villagra will take on the role of chief people officer.

Generative Pre-trained Transformer 4 (GPT-4) is a large language model developed by OpenAI and the fourth in its series of GPT foundation models. In September 2025, following the suicide of a 16-year-old, OpenAI said it planned to add restrictions for users under 18, including the blocking of graphic sexual content and the prevention of flirtatious talk. It was capable of autonomously performing tasks through web browser interactions, including filling forms, placing online orders, scheduling appointments, and other browser-based tasks. These images are generated with C2PA metadata, which can be used to verify that they are AI-generated.

CEO Sam Altman said that the company is delaying the release of its open model, which had already been postponed by a month earlier this summer. ChatGPT now receives 2.5 billion prompts daily from users worldwide, including roughly 330 million from the U.S. Unlike human therapists, AI tools aren’t bound by doctor-patient confidentiality, he noted. OpenAI said the chatbot was on track to hit 700 million weekly active users in the first week of August, up from 500 million at the end of March. General Services Administration (GSA) added OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic to its approved AI vendor list, allowing agencies to access these tools through preset contracts without negotiating pricing. Most users will want Auto, but the additional control will be useful for some people.Rate limits are now 3,000 messages/week with GPT-5 Thinking, and then extra capacity on GPT-5 Thinking…