ChatGPT hits 60,000 advertisers, but OpenAI's ad revenue looks set to fall short of its target

ChatGPT has been signing up advertisers at a fast clip, but that growth has yet to turn into meaningful revenue for OpenAI. The number of companies advertising on the platform rose from about 20,000 at the end of August to roughly 60,000 in early October, according to Dan Salmon, a partner at New Street Research.

Pricing goes a long way toward explaining the volume. A click on ChatGPT costs about $5, compared with $30 to $50 for similar business software ads on Google. Even so, OpenAI is expected to come in below the $2.4 billion in advertising revenue it projected to investors for 2026, according to The Information, as reported by MarTech in a story published on November 10.

From a closed pilot to an ad platform

Advertising on ChatGPT started out as a tightly controlled pilot. OpenAI charged on a CPM basis, required a minimum commitment of $200,000 and limited access to a small group of large advertisers.

Today the company accepts both CPM and CPC bids, with a recommended bid of $3 to $5 per click. OpenAI has also tested CPA bidding with select advertisers, a pricing model it has not publicly confirmed.

Self-serve buying is moving forward too. When ChatGPT Ads launched in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and Taiwan in September, companies in those markets could buy through Ads Manager from day one. With that expansion, ads became available in more than 60 countries.

In MarTech's view, the shift moves ChatGPT out of the planning meeting and into the test budget, but it also suggests advertisers are not exactly lining up to get in. The outlet also questions OpenAI's claim that ChatGPT Ads reached a $1 billion annualized revenue run rate less than 200 days after launch. The company has offered no proof, and because it is privately held, there is no way to verify the figure.

Targeting starts with the conversation

According to OpenAI, ad selection can take into account the context and intent of the ongoing conversation, topic descriptions submitted by the advertiser, the ad itself and its landing page, plus other signals when personalization is turned on. Instead of exact-match keywords, advertisers can provide "context hints" that describe the conversations or subjects where the ad would be relevant.

Advertisers can also upload email addresses and phone numbers to match against customer lists. According to Gadget Review's account of OpenAI's documentation, these audiences require a minimum of 25,000 users.

OpenAI says it works with DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science on brand suitability assessments and has safeguards in place to keep ads away from sensitive or emotionally vulnerable conversations. According to the company, these partners do not have access to private conversations.

For brand teams, ChatGPT now sits somewhere between a search ad and an audience ad: the conversation reveals immediate intent, and list matching layers in first-party data. The cost of entry has dropped to test-budget territory, but the ad appears next to a private conversation that can change direction with every message, which calls for a fresh look at brand safety.