ChatGPT down: Global outage affects millions

OpenAI's AI chatbot, ChatGPT, faced another outage on Thursday evening, just hours after the company claimed the service had been restored.

Users began reporting issues around 6:42 PM IST, following an earlier outage earlier in the day. OpenAI addressed the problem on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), stating they were "investigating the issue."

Outage tracking site Downdetector recorded a spike in reports during the second disruption, with over 1,000 complaints logged. Users reported encountering "Bad Gateway" errors and experiencing difficulties with slow logins and performance on both the web and app versions of ChatGPT.

Reports also suggest that the outage may have impacted other OpenAI services, including the GPT-4o and GPT-4o mini models, raising concerns about broader system disruptions.

As of the latest update, OpenAI confirmed that it is actively working to resolve the issues.

However, the platform remains intermittently inaccessible, with frustrated users flooding social media to share their experiences.

This disruption occurs within the context of OpenAI's freemium business model (with paid tiers up to $200/month) and a recent $500 billion investment pledge in US AI infrastructure by OpenAI and other tech firms. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman reported over 300 million weekly users in December.