OpenAI announced on August 27 that it will bring ChatGPT Ads to India, expanding its advertising platform to one of the chatbot's largest and most active markets. The program will show ads to logged-in adult users on the Free tier and the Go subscription tier, priced at ₹399 per month in India. All paid subscriptions including Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, and Education will remain ad-free, as detailed in the company's testing ads announcement.
More than 50 brands are set to begin advertising on ChatGPT in India starting this week, with media agencies WPP and Omnicom serving as OpenAI's first agency partners in the country, according to Fortune India. The two agencies will support advertisers across strategy, creative work, measurement, brand safety, and campaign execution. OpenAI said the partnership is non-exclusive and it will continue to bring on other agencies over time.
Self-serve access to the ChatGPT Ads Manager will open on September 4, allowing businesses of all sizes to run campaigns independently with daily budgets starting at ₹725.
How the ads will work
Ads will appear below a ChatGPT response when there is a relevant sponsored product or service tied to the conversation topic. OpenAI says ads will be clearly labeled as sponsored and visually separated from the organic answer. The company maintains that ads do not influence the answers ChatGPT gives.
During the test phase, OpenAI matches ads submitted by advertisers with the topic of your conversation and your past interactions with ads. If you are researching recipes, for example, you may see ads for meal kits or grocery delivery. If multiple advertisers are relevant, OpenAI selects the most relevant one to show first.
Dave Dugan, Vice President and Head of Global Ads Solutions at OpenAI, said in a statement: "India is one of the most dynamic markets in the world for how people use ChatGPT to learn, build, and discover. Our weekly active users have doubled year-on-year, with many of them going beyond simple searches and changing how they make decisions."
Privacy and safety guardrails
OpenAI has built several guardrails into the ad system. Advertisers do not get access to users' chats, chat history, memories, or personal details. They only receive aggregate campaign performance data such as impressions and clicks. The company explicitly stated it does not sell user data to advertisers.
Ads will not appear on accounts belonging to people who identify themselves or are predicted to be under 18 years old. They will also be excluded from sensitive or regulated topics including mental health, health, and politics.
Users have control over their advertising experience. You can dismiss ads, provide feedback, learn why a particular ad was shown, manage personalization settings, and clear the data used for advertising at any time.
A broader rollout
The India announcement is part of a wider expansion of ChatGPT Ads beyond its initial testing markets. OpenAI first announced plans to test ads in the United States in February 2026. The pilot later expanded to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand in March, then to the United Kingdom, Mexico, Brazil, Japan, and South Korea in May and August.
India was one of the first markets to receive ChatGPT Go, a subscription tier priced at ₹399 per month that was offered free for one year to eligible users as part of a promotional offer. India has over 100 million weekly active users as of February 2026, making it a strategically critical market for the company's advertising ambitions.
Why OpenAI is turning to ads
Advertising is a crucial part of OpenAI's revenue strategy as the company seeks to generate income from the hundreds of millions of people who use ChatGPT on its Free tier and lower-priced subscription plans. Revenue figures cited by multiple outlets including The Hindu BusinessLine were reported by the Wall Street Journal: OpenAI's revenue rose to $6.7 billion in the June-ended quarter from $5.7 billion in the previous quarter, while its operating loss widened to $12.3 billion in Q2 2026 from $9.3 billion in Q1 2026.
The advertising model is not unique to OpenAI. Microsoft Copilot and Google's AI Overviews also feature ads, showing that advertising remains an attractive revenue model in the AI era. OpenAI's approach differs in that it builds ads directly into the conversational interface rather than placing banners alongside search results.
What comes next
OpenAI said it will continue to learn from feedback from both users and advertisers as the program rolls out in India. The company expects to introduce more advertising formats, campaign objectives, and buying options over time.
The advertising business is positioned as a way to support continued investment in free and affordable access to AI tools. At the same time, OpenAI's long-term focus remains on building products that users and businesses find valuable enough to pay for directly. Enterprise and subscription businesses are already strong, and the company sees advertising as one piece of a diverse revenue model rather than the primary one.
For Indian businesses, ChatGPT Ads presents a new channel to reach people at moments when they are actively exploring options, comparing choices, or working toward a decision. For users, the tradeoff is clear: you can keep using ChatGPT on the Free tier with ads, subscribe to Go at ₹399 per month and still see ads, or pay for Plus or Pro to get an ad-free experience.
The full rollout trajectory will be interesting to watch. If India performs well as an advertising market, expect OpenAI to accelerate expansion into other large emerging markets where the Free tier is the dominant way people access the chatbot.