OpenAI is getting a lot less shy about putting ads into ChatGPT.
If you use the ChatGPT mobile app, you may have already noticed. According to newly released US data from the market intelligence firm Sensor Tower, ChatGPT users on the mobile app saw roughly twice as many ads per hour this July as they did in April.
OpenAI is betting big on advertising as it hopes to convert its huge user base into a cash-printing machine, and Sensor Tower’s data gave us a peek at how that’s going so far. Already, ChatGPT has nearly tripled its number of advertisers, with Sensor Tower estimating that the number of advertisers on ChatGPT has leaped from around 300 in April to more than 820 this July, with at least 160 of that tally joining this month.
Mainstream brands are also picking up steam on ChatGPT, per Sensor Tower’s estimates. Back in April, the firm counted tech companies like Speechify, Jotform, and Natural Intelligence among ChatGPT’s most prevalent advertisers. For July, those companies have dropped out of Sensor Tower’s top 10, replaced by major brands like Booking Holdings, Intuit, Home Depot, and L.L.Bean.
Scheels, the sports clothing retailer, was the only company in the top 10 advertisers on ChatGPT in both April and July, the estimates showed. That’s despite an overall decrease in the share of ads that Sensor Tower has spotted from the shopping industry, though it says retail is still ChatGPT’s biggest sector by ad spend.
Meanwhile, the firm has seen ads for financial services, travel and tourism, and jobs and education eat into retail’s slice of the pie.
Financial services companies have seen the largest increase in the share of advertising spend on ChatGPT, rising from 2% to 12% since April. It’s the third largest sector after shopping and software; Sensor Tower said BestMoney.com, a financial services company, was one of July’s top advertisers on ChatGPT.
“ChatGPT is effectively diversifying its advertiser base, appealing to a wider swath of businesses, which bodes well for ramping monetization and expanding ad formats,” the market intelligence firm wrote.
Other companies that topped Sensor Tower’s estimates for ChatGPT spending in July include travel companies Expedia and GetYourGuide Deutschland, recruiting company Talent Inc., and the retailer Quince.
Sensor Tower’s estimates are based largely on data from a user panel and third-party data sources, Abe Yousef, senior insights analyst, told Business Insider. OpenAI declined to comment for this story.
OpenAI serves ads to users who don’t pay for a plan or who pay for ChatGPT’s $8-a-month Go plan. The vast majority of the company’s users fall into these groups.
Sensor Tower estimated that ChatGPT’s app hit 1 billion monthly users in May. That massive user base gives OpenAI an opportunity to build a large revenue stream alongside its subscription service.
The push is still in its infancy. It reported a $100 million tally for annual recurring ad revenue in May. It still has a long way to go to catch up to ad juggernauts like Google and Meta, which reported $81.6 billion and $59.3 billion in ad revenues, respectively, for their most recent fiscal quarters.
OpenAI’s ads chief, Dave Dugan, told Business Insider in June that in the first weeks of the ads push, they placed ads “very conservatively” to prioritize the user’s experience on the app.
“We’ve learned so much about user satisfaction, and as we’ve now, four months in, we’ve gotten more confidence about how we can deliver volume,” he said.
For now, OpenAI places ads on ChatGPT beneath the AI’s answer to a user’s prompt and doesn’t place them next to queries about personal health or politics.
Advertisers previously told Business Insider that self-serve ChatGPT’s ad product, launched in May, is rudimentary compared to the services run by Google and Meta. Still, OpenAI is expanding into new markets and adding more tools in a push to attract more ad money to its popular app.
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