OpenAI Tests Sponsored Agents, Adds AI Tools for ChatGPT Advertisers

OpenAI said Wednesday it is testing allowing some U.S. advertisers to sponsor AI agents working in ChatGPT, a move that would bring ChatGPT ads closer to what Google and Meta Platforms already offer.

ChatGPT users who click an ad can now start a conversation with an AI agent to ask follow-up questions about the product or service, the company said in a blog post. Those conversations are separate from the original ChatGPT chat the user was already in, the AI giant said.

OpenAI is also rolling out AI tools for the advertisers themselves. They can now manage campaigns by typing prompts into Ads Manager, the dashboard OpenAI unveiled in May that enables brands to set up and track campaigns. OpenAI can then draft ad copy and images for them. If the advertisers opt in, OpenAI will also rewrite the ads’ headlines during the chat to match what a user is talking about and translate them into the user’s language.

Google and Meta have been selling creative ad tools since 2023. Meta launched in June an AI tool that handles customer chats for businesses across Whatsapp, Messenger and Instagram. In July, Google announced a chatbot that appears in search ads that allows shoppers to chat in real time with the advertiser’s website.

In late August, OpenAI said ads had reached a $1 billion annualized run rate, a sign it will finish 2026 well below the $2.4 billion in total ad revenue it projected for the year. The company at the time called advertising “one pillar of OpenAI’s diversified business model, alongside consumer subscriptions, enterprise offerings and usage-based APIs,” referring to the technology developers use to plug into its models.