ChatGPT Ads Go Live in 31 European Markets Today & Free Users Can’t Opt Out

Summary

OpenAI is expanding ChatGPT Ads to 31 European markets starting today, August 24, its largest rollout since the advertising business launched in the US in February. Countries going live today include Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Ireland, Belgium, and Portugal. Ads are shown only to users on the Free and Go plans. Plus, Pro, and Enterprise subscribers remain ad-free. Targeting is contextual: ads are served based on what you are currently discussing, your approximate location, device type, time of day, and language. Your chat history and stored memories are explicitly excluded from ad targeting. Users can adjust ad personalization settings, but opting out of personalization changes which ads you see, not whether you see them. There is no ad-free option on the Free tier.

Why it matters

If you are a ChatGPT Free or Go plan user in Europe, ads started appearing in your conversations today. For US readers, this has already been the reality since February. The policy on opting out is worth understanding: you can limit personalization, but you cannot remove ads without paying for a Plus or Pro subscription. For families with kids using ChatGPT on free accounts, this is the moment to verify what plan they are on and what controls are available. OpenAI has confirmed that chat history and memories do not feed ad targeting, which addresses the biggest privacy concern, but the ad-or-pay structure is now clearly the model going forward globally.

HTD Says

ChatGPT ads went live across 31 European countries this morning, and if you or anyone you know uses the free tier, ads are now part of the experience with no way to turn them off short of upgrading to a paid plan. We all love seeing ads, right? Wrong. I honestly cannot stand the ads on my streaming services, but I still am not ready to jump up a plan level. Having ads in streaming actually gives you a quick break to do something.

Ads within AI chat are something different altogether. While ads on a streaming service are relatively targeted (some are incredibly NOT targeted or relevant), ads within ChatGPT are contextual and based on what you are chatting about. To me, it almost feels like an invasion of privacy and a bit scary. What type of data do advertisers get? There are privacy settings to exclude certain aspects of your information, but…

I understand that OpenAI needs to make money, and ads are the easiest way to do so for consumers. And it makes sense that the free ChatGPT plans are the ones getting ads. But I’m honestly a bit surprised that the EU is allowing this, given how incredibly concerned they are about privacy and data security.

Source:

Euronews