Under the growing pressure of commercialization, OpenAI has finally made an official response regarding the advertising monetization path for ChatGPT. The company recently stated in response to media inquiries that it is studying the introduction of advertising formats within the ChatGPT product to support its increasingly large operational costs and provide sustainable intelligent services for free users. Although this initiative was previously delayed due to a surge in Gemini users, the advertising strategy has returned to the agenda as revenue pressures become more apparent.

 Ad Formats Under Exploration, Emphasizing "Respecting User Trust"

OpenAI emphasized that any advertising solution must be designed with maintaining user trust in ChatGPT as a core prerequisite. Potential forms currently under internal discussion include:

- Prioritizing the display of sponsored content in responses (e.g., "Travel plans recommended by XX brand");

- Embedding ads related to user queries in the sidebar;

- Triggering ads only when the user's conversation involves commercial intent such as shopping or booking;

- Displaying ads as an auxiliary step, after the user clicks on a link generated by ChatGPT.

The company clearly stated that it will not forcibly insert disruptive ads into the core conversation flow, to avoid disrupting the user experience.

 Free Users as Key Growth, Advertising Revenue May Reach $1.5 Billion by 2030

Currently, OpenAI's main sources of revenue are:

- Subscription services (ChatGPT Plus/Pro/Business);

- API call services;

- Enterprise-level solutions.

However, facing the reality of exceeding $10 billion in revenue by 2025 but still facing huge losses (projected annual operating loss of $74 billion by 2028), OpenAI urgently needs to explore new revenue streams. According to internal estimates, each free user can contribute about $2 in advertising revenue per year. If the number of ChatGPT free users remains in the hundreds of millions, advertising revenue could exceed $1.5 billion by 2030, becoming the third major pillar after subscriptions and APIs.

 Privacy Concerns Emerge: A More Knowledgeable AI Than Google

Different from traditional search engines, ChatGPT holds richer and more private contextual information—from health consultations to financial planning, from emotional confessions to career planning. If this data is used for targeted advertising, its accuracy may far surpass that of Google. Although OpenAI promises that "ads will not be based on sensitive content," defining what constitutes "sensitive" and achieving data isolation still raise widespread concerns among users and regulators.

As a comparison, Google generated $237.8 billion in advertising revenue in 2023, accounting for 77% of Alphabet's total revenue, providing strong support for its AI infrastructure investment. OpenAI clearly hopes to replicate this "advertising fueling technology" flywheel, but it faces higher trust barriers.

 AIbase Observation: Advertising Is Not the End, but the Beginning of the Battle for Survival

OpenAI's exploration of advertising is essentially a difficult balance between idealism and commercial reality. On one side is Sam Altman's commitment to "making AI benefit all humanity"; on the other side are the billions of dollars in computing power and talent costs each year. If handled improperly, advertising could erode ChatGPT's most valuable asset—user trust; but if successful, it could become the "oxygen" supporting long-term AGI development.

When AI assistants start recommending "products it thinks you need," we may ask: is this convenience or control? And OpenAI is standing at the crossroads of ethics and business.