ChatGPT Ads Land In India: What Free And Go Users Will Now See On Their Screen

Nothing stays free forever — and ChatGPT's ad-free run in India just ended. OpenAI has started showing ads on ChatGPT's Free and Go tiers in India, one of its largest…

By Reetam Bodhak

August 28, 2026

3 min read

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Nothing stays free forever — and ChatGPT’s ad-free run in India just ended. OpenAI has started showing ads on ChatGPT’s Free and Go tiers in India, one of its largest markets, with more than 100 million weekly active users in the country.

What’s Changing For Indian Users

ChatGPT started showing advertisements to Free and Go users in India from Thursday, appearing below a response only when there’s a relevant sponsored product or service — the ads won’t influence ChatGPT’s actual answers.The ads will be shown specifically to logged-in users aged 18 and above, while Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, and Education subscribers will continue seeing no ads at all.

Detail	Information
Applies To	Free tier & Go tier (₹399/month)
Ad-Free Tiers	Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, Education
Minimum Age	18+
Agency Partners	WPP, Omnicom
Brands Launching	50+ this week
Self-Serve Ads Manager	Live from September 4

How The Ads Actually Work

Sponsored products or services will appear at the bottom of ChatGPT responses, clearly labelled and visually separate from the chatbot’s answers..Users will also get the option to dismiss an ad, give feedback, manage ad personalisation, or clear the data OpenAI uses to show relevant ads.

On the privacy front, OpenAI said advertisers won’t get access to users’ conversations, chat history, saved memories, or personal information, and the company won’t sell individual user data — advertisers only receive aggregated metrics like impressions and clicks.Ads also won’t appear alongside sensitive topics like mental health and politics.

Why Now?

The move comes as OpenAI looks to maximize revenue ahead of a planned public listing next year, having reportedly filed confidential IPO paperwork.Its June-quarter revenue reached $6.7 billion, up from $5.7 billion previously, while its operating loss also widened to $12.3 billion from $9.3 billion.The US ad pilot reportedly crossed $100 million in annualised revenue within six weeks of launch before expanding globally.

Notably, not everyone in the AI space is following suit. (cite index=”35-1″>Anthropic, the maker of rival chatbot Claude, has said it will keep Claude ad-free, with no sponsored content influencing conversations or shown near them.</cite>

Advertising-supported free tiers are a well-established model across the broader online advertising industry, and AI chatbots appear to be the latest frontier for it.

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