OpenAI is switching on advertising in 26 more countries, including Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Peru, Nigeria, South Africa, Serbia, Ukraine, Cambodia, Bangladesh and Pakistan. The company said more than 100,000 advertisers have now run campaigns on ChatGPT.
The expansion takes the footprint to roughly 89 markets. OpenAI had 20,000 advertisers in late August and reached 63 countries in September, which makes the latest jump its fastest yet.
The ads appear for Free and Go users as they compare products and decide what to buy inside a conversation. OpenAI began selling advertising in the United States in February.
Why the free tier matters
Free and low-cost users generate enormous query volume but little subscription revenue, and inference for those sessions is not free. Ads convert some of that traffic into margin without asking users in price-sensitive markets to pay a monthly fee.
The company has also tested placements near generated images and sponsored agents inside shopping conversations.
The trust question
Ads inside a conversational assistant are harder to label than a banner on a web page. Regulators in several markets have begun asking how sponsored answers differ from organic ones, and whether a model’s recommendation can be bought.
OpenAI has said advertising will not influence model answers. Independent verification of that claim is not yet available, and for publishers the bigger worry is inventory: a consumer assistant that sells its own placements competes for budgets that once went to search and display.
