If you’ve been Googling things like "are there ads in chatgpt" or "will there be ads in chatgpt" you’re not alone. As of December 2025, OpenAI says there are no live tests for ads in ChatGPT, and it disabled promotional in-app suggestions that users felt looked like ads.
You generally can’t “insert ads” into OpenAI’s ChatGPT product the way you’d place a banner on a website. The same is true for Claude as a consumer product - Anthropic primarily positions Claude around subscription plans, not an ad-supported model.
Why the talks of ads in the first place?
OpenAI is facing massive scale and costs, which is fueling endless "ads in ChatGPT" rumors. Here's the breakdown:
OpenAI's User Scale vs Paid Conversion
ChatGPT reached 800 million weekly active users in Dec 2025. Of the users:
- Only ~5% paid conversion: 35-40 million on Plus/Pro as of July 2025.
- And 7 million business seats were reported on enterprise / team / edu plans.
- ~765 million users are free.
Revenue vs Cash Burn
A report sourced to OpenAI financial disclosures said OpenAI generated $4.3B in revenue in the first half of 2025, while burning $2.5B in the same period - driven “in large part” by R&D and the cost of running ChatGPT. The same reporting said OpenAI targeted a $8.5B cash-burn number for 2025.
That’s the context for why the “ads in ChatGPT” rumor cycle keeps resurfacing. At this scale, even tiny per-user revenue boosts matter. OpenAI briefly showed in-app “app suggestions” that looked like ads to many users, then turned that behavior off after backlash. OpenAI said those suggestions weren’t paid ads and that there are no live tests for ads, even while acknowledging that anything that feels like an ad has to be handled carefully because people trust the product.
Anthropic's Parallel Pressures
Anthropic is dealing with similar costs: serving inference is expensive, and scale pushes you toward monetization. Claude’s consumer offering is built around subscriptions (Pro, and higher tiers like Max), not an ad-supported chatbot. Anthropic itself doesn’t publish a clean “free users vs paid users” split, but it does clearly offer paid tiers like Claude Pro ($20/month) and Claude Max ($100/$200 per month) for heavier usage.
And on the company economics side, Reuters-reported figures (sourced to The Information) said Anthropic expected to burn about $3B in 2025, and that it burned $5.6B the prior year - again, not “free tier only,” but a reminder that these companies are spending huge amounts just to build and operate these systems. That’s why subscription plans, enterprise seats, and other monetization models are always in the conversation.
While Anthropic hasn't mentioned ads as of yet, it will become a possibility depending on how much money is being burned on free users.
That all said, you can still run ads inside AI projects or GPTs you own
In essence, you can't control ChatGPT's core UI. You can control the user experience and output of their products though.
So if you're creating a lead magnet through a CustomGPT, or you have a Gemini Gem or Anthropic Project, you can still run ads targeting the users.
If you own the product surface, you can design conversational ad placements that are consistent, measurable, and respectful to the user’s intent.
4Fsh Team
FAQ
So can I put in AI Ads?
Yes. It wouldn't be the same experience developer side as with other ad tools, but you can still put in ads in your tools.
What kind of ads can I put into AI right now?
You can put in sponsored links, paywalls, or banners.
Does the ToS stop me from adding ads in AI?
There isn't language in the ToS for OpenAI and Anthropic regarding ads as of December 2025, but Gemini has a pre-existing ad infrastructure with Google with their own stances for ads.
That said, within the ToS are clauses for anti-deception and anti-spam.
What are best practices for putting in ads in AI content?
Keep it relevant, limit frequency, and make sure that the primary answer still solves the user's problem.
Do I need to use an API to put in ads?
No. We go more over how to put in ads in our course.
Can I monetize my AI ads?
Yes, but the way you would be monetizing is different in comparison to hosting an ad network. There are some companies that are looking at putting ads in 3rd party AI tools with APIs, but you don't need to put in an API to start monetizing.
