Sam Altman outlines ChatGPT upgrades as GPT-5 complaints hit hard
What's the story
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has announced major upgrades for ChatGPT, following a surge in demand after the launch of GPT-5. The latest language model was released last week but received a lukewarm response from users. Many paying customers took to social media threatening to cancel their subscriptions due to the removal of all previous AI models with the new release.
User retention strategies
OpenAI reintroduces GPT-4o for Plus subscribers
In response to the backlash, OpenAI has taken several measures to appease its users, especially those on the $20/month Plus tier. The company recently reintroduced GPT-4o for paid users and announced plans to offer 3,000 queries per week of the new GPT-5 thinking model. This is a significant increase from the initial limit of 200 queries per week at GPT-5's launch.
Commitment to users
Altman promises improved experience for free users
Altman has assured that OpenAI will ensure "current paying ChatGPT users get more total usage than they did before GPT-5." He also promised to "increase the quality of the free tier of ChatGPT," although he didn't elaborate on what this would entail. The promise comes as a relief to many users who were disappointed by the changes brought by GPT-5.
Model adjustments
GPT-5's 'warmer' tweak to address emotional depth concerns
Altman had previously said that OpenAI would tweak GPT-5 to make it 'warmer.' This comes after users complained that the model lacked emotional depth in its responses, unlike its predecessors. The complaints also included shorter answers from the new AI model. Despite these issues, OpenAI claims GPT-5 has made significant improvements in areas like coding, reasoning, accuracy, health writing and multimodal reasoning.
Model enhancements
New personalities added with GPT-5
Along with the launch of GPT-5, OpenAI also replaced the model picker system with a new unified system. This real-time router decides which queries to send to the standard model and which ones to the reasoning model. The company has also introduced four new personalities - Cynic, Robot, Listener and Nerd with GPT-5. This feature is currently available only for paying customers of OpenAI.