ChatGPT Down: Outage Affects Thousands of Users Worldwide, OpenAI Investigates
ChatGPT faced a global outage as thousands reported issues accessing the AI chatbot. OpenAI confirmed a partial disruption and is investigating the cause of the problem.
ChatGPT, the widely used artificial intelligence chatbot by OpenAI, faced a major outage on Wednesday, leaving thousands of users unable to access the platform. The disruption, which began around 12:25pm IST, has been acknowledged by the company, which confirmed it was working to resolve the problem.
Thousands Affected by ChatGPT Outage
According to outage tracker Downdetector, the issue peaked at 12:56pm IST, with 547 reports of disruption. Around 82 percent of users said they could not access ChatGPT across all platforms, while 15 percent faced issues specifically on the website. Another 2 percent of reports highlighted problems using the app.
The outage followed a much larger disruption on Tuesday at 2:40am IST, when about 2,200 users globally reported similar difficulties.
OpenAI Responds to the Incident
OpenAI updated its status page to confirm a partial outage, stating, “ChatGPT not displaying responses. We are investigating the issue for the listed services.” However, the company did not disclose the exact cause of either outage.
The affected users reported that while they were able to send messages, the chatbot failed to generate any response.
Outage Follows New Safety Announcements
The timing of the outage is notable, as it occurred just a day after OpenAI revealed plans to strengthen safeguards for teenagers and emotionally distressed users. The company is working on new parental controls, human moderation for sensitive conversations, and improved monitoring to better handle cases involving harm to self or others.
These safety measures were announced after two tragic incidents linked to ChatGPT interactions, including the suicide of a teenager who had been confiding in the chatbot for months, and a separate case where a 56-year-old man killed his mother before taking his own life.
Current Status
While reports of the outage have reduced since the peak, OpenAI has not confirmed that the issue is fully resolved. The company has assured users that engineers are working to restore normal functionality as soon as possible.
