While OpenAI continues to insist that there are currently no ads — or tests for advertising — live in ChatGPT, the company’s chief research officer Mark Chen also acknowledged that the company “fell short” with recent promotional messages and is working to improve the experience.
Chen and other OpenAI executives were responding to posts from ChatGPT’s paying subscribers who complained about seeing promotional messages for companies like Peloton and Target.
In response, the company said it was only testing ways to show apps built on the ChatGPT app platform that it announced in October, with “no financial component” to those suggestions. (One of the users who’d complained initially about the ads responded skeptically, writing, “Bruhhh… Don’t insult your paying users.”)
I'm in ChatGPT (paid Plus subscription), asking about Windows BitLocker
and it's F-ing showing me ADS TO SHOP AT TARGET.
Yeah, screw this. Lose all your users. pic.twitter.com/2Z5AG8pnlJ — Benjamin De Kraker (@BenjaminDEKR) December 3, 2025
Similarly, ChatGPT head Nick Turley posted Friday that he was “seeing lots of confusion about ads rumors in ChatGPT.”
“There are no live tests for ads – any screenshots you’ve seen are either not real or not ads,” Turley wrote. “If we do pursue ads, we’ll take a thoughtful approach. People trust ChatGPT and anything we do will be designed to respect that.”
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