Tag: advertising

OpenAI expects ad revenue of $2.5 billion this year, and $100B by 2030

If OpenAI continues on its growth trajectory, they project massive earnings from ads. (Picture: Adobe)
Counting on continuing the pace of user growth, OpenAI is banking on ad revenues well above the more cautious estimates of $1 billion, Axios reports, citing sources privy to investor presentations.

The growth to $100 billion revenue will be possible if they hit a target of 2.7 billion weekly users by 2030 — and would put it in contention with some of the world’s largest advertising platforms, notes Reuters.

Behemoths like Google and Meta has advertising revenues of $295 and $196 billion annually as of today, and OpenAI’s planned trajectory would make AI chatbots one of the pillars of online marketing.

Previously, OpenAI shared a projected $100 million revenue from ads after just six weeks of operation, and said they were building a self-serve advertising platform.

Read more: Axios and Reuters.

OpenAI projects $100 million in annualized revenue from ChatGPT ads test

Ads on ChatGPT are just being shown to a tiny fraction of users, but that’s about to change. (Picture: Adobe)
The figure was reached from a small pilot of 600 advertisers serving less than 20% of Free and Go users, Reuters reports.

85% of these users in the USA are eligible to receive ads, but far fewer ads are shown in the trial that started in February.

The minimum asking price to get on the test program is said to be $200,000 and the projected revenue once the trial goes live to more users is about a billion dollars a year.

80% of the advertisers on the platform are small and medium-sized businesses, Reuters notes, and OpenAI is set to debut a self-serve advertising platform already in April.

Read more: Reuters and CNBC.

As OpenAI prepares to show ads to all Free and Go users, advertisers are giddy

Everyone on Free and Go plans will be getting ads before soon. (Picture: screenshot)
According to The Information (paywalled), OpenAI will soon stop its «experiment» in ads. They will go for a full advertising service in «the coming weeks,» reports Reuters.

That means the test with showing some ads to about 5% of users is coming to an end, and the full plan will start up just after easter.

The limited advertising has so far been a success. The main complaint from advertisers is that it’s going too slow, according to CNBC. Most of them are happy and ready to spend more — with more varied ads.

— We’re encouraged by early signals from users and participating brands, and continue to see strong interest from advertisers, OpenAI tells CNBC.

The advertising program on Free and Go tiers is expected to earn OpenAI about $1 billion per year, and usher in a third tier for advertisers in addition to Search, Social, and Retail.

Read more: The Information (paywalled), Reuters, and CNBC.

Big brands are hitting ChatGPT ads — but only show in 0.8% of responses

Ads from Expedia, Qualcomm, Best Buy, and Enterprise Mobility have started appearing in relation to ChatGPT queries, Adweek reports.

The «early tests» have been ongoing since February 9th, and OpenAI is asking advertisers to pay a $200,000 minimum to join in.

— We believe ads play an important role in continuing to support broad access to AI, Asad Awan, ads and monetization lead at OpenAI, tells Adweek in a statement.

— By working closely with partners in this pilot, we’re able to thoughtfully test new ad experiences, he continues.

The advertising intelligence platform Adthena ran a test on over 500 prompts in ChatGPT and found ad placements on only 0.8% of responses, according to Adweek.

Adthena also found ads were clearly labeled, sometimes triggering on the first prompt, that OpenAI is surpisingly focused on privacy and user control, and that the text format seemed familiar and trusted.

Read more: Adweek, and Adthena on LinkedIn.

Anthropic won the Super Bowl ads war

Anthropic’s ad was about ads in chat responses, and it seems to have landed. (Picture: Screenshot)
While the AI Super Bowl ads had generally lower engagement than others — there was a battle over mindshare brewing between them.

Anthropic won that battle, and saw a jump in daily active users of 11%, CNBC writes, quoting BNP Paribas. In comparison, ChatGPT jumped 2.7% and Gemini added 1.4%.

Anthropic also won the battle over social media engagement, with more positive posts (25.5%) after their ad was shown than OpenAI (16.3%) — even though OpenAI led with 25K posts to Anthropic’s 10K.

Measuring through Instagram, OpenAI’s ad scored a 44% positive sentiment from 3,829 engagements on its post, while Anthropic scored 41% on 3,738 mentions, far behind the likes of Pepsi’s 33K mentions.

Read more: CNBC, Business Insider and Digiday.

Ads are now live on Free and Go tiers of ChatGPT in the USA

Ads are supposed to finance giving free users the latest tech and the most messages, OpenAI says. (Picture: OpenAI)
The ads will be clearly labeled, separated from ChatGPT responses and won’t influence what the Chatbot says. Chats will be «kept private» from advertisers, OpenAI says.

— Our goal is for ads to support broader access to more powerful ChatGPT features while maintaining the trust people place in ChatGPT for important and personal tasks, they write.

Paid tiers other than Go won’t be seeing any ads at all, and the stated reason for them is to give more queries and responses to the ad-supported tiers, while keeping them fast and responsive.

It’s possible to turn off ads and get limited messages, and under-18s won’t be getting ads. They will also be disabled for «sensitive topics» such as health, mental health and politics.

The test is only for the U.S. market as it stands, and the plan is for ads to make up a little less than half of OpenAIs income once they get off the ground, CNBC reports.

Read more: OpenAI’s announcement. Writeups on Engadget, The Verge, and Gizmodo.

OpenAI to start «public» advertising tests on ChatGPT

What ads will look like If you click it, you can query it for more information. (Picture: OpenAI)
The tests will happen «during the coming weeks» for ChatGPT Free and Go tiers — and will try to put relevant, clearly labeled ads beneath GPT responses, OpenAI announces.

OpenAI says they won’t share your data or conversation to advertisers, and will «maintain a high standard» where you can turn off personalization if you want to.

They won’t be shown to under-18s, they say, nor will they show on sensitive topics, such as physical health, mental health or politics.

The neat part of the coming ads is that you click on them and query them for further detail, which is a feature not found in traditional advertising.

The Financial times estimates that OpenAI can earn somewhere around the «low billions» from advertising.

Ads won’t be shown for paying tiers, such as Plus, Pro and Enterprise.

Read more: OpenAI’s announcement. Writeups on Reuters, The Verge and Ars Technica.

OpenAI to serve ads in internal version of ChatGPT ahead of public launch

What it could look like with sponsored posts in the sidebar of ChatGPT. (Picture: generated)
According to journalist Alex Heath on the Sources blog, CEO of Applications Fidji Simo has let OpenAI employees know that they plan to start showing ads in an internal version of ChatGPT, hinting that the work at OpenAI is getting ready for prime time.

Bleepingcomputer also quoted yesterday a report from The Information (paywalled) saying that mockups displaying sponsored information have begun to appear in a sidebar next to the to the main ChatGPT window internally.

Continue reading “OpenAI to serve ads in internal version of ChatGPT ahead of public launch”

Head of ChatGPT says not doing ad tests, despite a Target notice this week

These were not ads, OpenAI says, and anyway, they have been shut off.
Many users were confronted with this graphic at the end of ChatGPT’s responses this week. OpenAI says they are now stopped, and that they weren’t ads. (Picture: screenshot)
People have been complaining about ads being sneakily inserted in their ChatGPT responses late this week, with a «Shop for home…» Target link showing up in their responses.

This comes hot on the heels of an engineer discovering ad code in the Android app — which left a lot of people cautious of such inserts.

It happened to enough people to notice, along with this writer, but it has since been turned off, says Mark Chen, Chief Research Officer at OpenAI:

Continue reading “Head of ChatGPT says not doing ad tests, despite a Target notice this week”

Altman declares «Code Red» at OpenAI, plans Gemini 3-beating model

OpenAI has put ads on hold until it can release a Gemini 3-beating model.
All other initiatives are on hold as OpenAI prepares its next model. (Picture: generated)
Competition is heating up in the AI chatbot market, as highlighted in the last weeks, with new, capable models from Google, Anthropic, and a new Codex Max from OpenAI.

This has now caused Altman to delay other initiatives, such as ads, to focus on making a better ChatGPT, paywalled The Information writes, citing an internal memo.

They are apparently planning to release a new reasoning model next week that will be «ahead of Gemini 3.» But this needs a little more polishing on the «experience.»

Just last week, a developer revealed ad code in the latest ChatGPT beta — meaning that their work on ads was fairly advanced and almost ready to ship.

This work is now on the back burner, at least until next week, when OpenAI hopes to reclaim their crown.

Read more: The Information (paywalled), and Reuters. Discussion on r/Singularity.

Developer finds ad references in latest ChatGPT beta

ChatGPT with ads? They could actually pay for more features while offering a revenue stream for OpenAI.
These little lines of code could be a harbinger of ads on the ChatGPT app. (Picture: Tibor Blaho)
This seems unconfirmed by anyone else, but strongly suggests that OpenAI is working on an ads product for their chatbot.

Tibor Blaho discovered the changes in the beta app for Android while doing routine versioning work for his job at AIPRM.com, which integrates tightly with ChatGPT.

He also likes to «share what is coming next with people who care about ChatGPT and Claude news.»

The new code indicates an ads «bazaar,» and a «SearchAd» with a «SearchAdsCarousel.»

Presumably, ads would begin rolling out on the free version of ChatGPT, where it could pay for offering more features. Or there could be affiliate marketing in the shopping links they just announced.

Google is already rolling out ads on their AI products, and Copilot and Perplexity have started using ads on shopping and follow-up-questions, notes Blaho.

Read more: Tibor Blaho’s x.com post, Bleeping Computer, discussion on r/Singularity.

Google puts «test» ads in AI Mode — and they use AI for targeting

Google's ads in AI Mode have been spotted in the wild, yet Google is already serving ads in Overviews.
Ads are the lifeblood of Google and this was only a question of time. (Picture: Adobe)
If you’ve been using AI Mode or AI Overviews this week, you might have seen something familiar from Google: Ads.

Google has long been signaling their intent to start experimenting with ads in AI outputs, and thinks some relevant ads might be sufficient.

These ads can appear above, beneath and within the results, Google says. And adds:

— For ads to show within the AI Overviews, the ads must additionally be relevant to the content of the AI Overviews.

For Google’s AI Mode, they are still «testing» and have been running with select ads since May, 2025, writes Engadget.

To match you with relevant ads, or even glean some kind of intent from your query, Google uses AI, and then relies on its deep catalog of advertisers to find a match.

Read more: Brodie Clark’s discovery tweet, Search Engine Land, Engadget, Google on ads in AI Overviews.

Google to start experimenting with ads in AI content

Robby Stein, of Google Search doesn't see ads going away, and lots of opportunity for them in Google's AI products.
Robby Stein, VP of Product for Google Search comments on advertising in Google’s AI. (Picture: screenshot).
In a wide-ranging interview on the podcast Silicon Valley Girl, Robby Stein, VP of Product for Google Search is positive about how advertising could get even more granular with all the extra information people can provide in their AI products, saying;

Ads not going away
— I don’t see them [ads] going away. The way people are using Google Search isn’t really changing, what is happening is that it’s expanding [with AI services], he opines.

Continue reading “Google to start experimenting with ads in AI content”

Weekend roundup: Resurrected Clippy, ChatGPT Business and AI Oreo ads

Microsoft wants to put up a nice face for you to talk to with Copilot.

Clippy much? Microsoft launches visualization of Copilot
If you ever use voice mode in Copilot, which Microsoft hopes to expand, you might see a new, expressive animation on your screen. That would be the newly announced «Mico.» Unlike the much maligned Clippy, Mico will use facial expressions that change as you talk. It’s only available in the US, and will work with an upcoming memory feature for Copilot to better respond to requests.
More at: Microsoft’s launch, The Verge and Ars Technica.

OpenAI announces ChatGPT Business
ChatGPT will now combine all the context of your businesses’ connected apps, like Slack, Sharepoint, Github and Google Drive. This makes it possible to ask pretty detailed questions about your business and have comprehensive answers delivered in one place — without the need to go searching through lots of different repositories. The feature is available tor Business, Enterprise and Education customers starting last Thursday.
More at: OpenAI’s launch page, The Verge and The Register.

Read on for more!

Continue reading “Weekend roundup: Resurrected Clippy, ChatGPT Business and AI Oreo ads”