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Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, speaking at the AI company's developer conference on Sept. 29, 2026. Andrej Sokolow | Picture Alliance | Getty Images OpenAI on Wednesday announced it will roll out ChatGPT Ads to 26 additional countries, its latest push to build out its nascent advertising unit. The artificial intelligence company has been touting its 8-month-old ads product as a new pillar of its business, which also includes enterprise contracts, consumer subscriptions and usage-based application programming interfaces, or APIs.
Digital ads have long been a major revenue stream for other big tech companies, including Google and Meta . OpenAI said its free users and Go subscribers in countries including Argentina, Peru, Nigeria, South Africa and Ukraine will start to see ads in ChatGPT. The ads are separate from ChatGPT's response to prompts, don't influence its answers and are clearly labeled, the company said.
"Our goal is to make ads useful to people as they pursue their goals and make decisions — and effective for the businesses that advertise with us," OpenAI said in a release. Read more CNBC tech news SpaceX earnings live updates: Here's why analysts are bullish ahead of the report Salesforce announces $5.66 billion deal for Braze, sending BRZE stock soaring 50% Anthropic in talks with neocloud Nscale over second multibillion-dollar deal, source tells CNBC Apple adds U.S. titanium supplier for iPhone Duo as supply stays tight OpenAI's ad business hit $1 billion in annualized revenue run rate in August, up from $100 million in March, as CNBC previously reported. The company said Wednesday that more than 100,000 advertisers have run campaigns on the platform.
Wednesday's announced expansion brings ChatGPT Ads to a total of 89 countries worldwide, OpenAI said. The company began testing ads in the U.S. in February, a decision that was ridiculed by chief rival Anthropic . Anthropic made OpenAI's ads push the focus of its first Super Bowl campaign and pledged to keep its competing chatbot, Claude, ad free.
Both OpenAI and Anthropic are gearing up for what are widely expected to be blockbuster initial public offerings , though they have not publicly disclosed when they plan to debut. OpenAI executives have signaled that they are eyeing a 2027 listing , while Anthropic's leaders have been actively meeting with prospective investors in recent weeks. OpenAI said it plans to continue developing additional ChatGPT Ads formats, measurement capabilities and buying options during its next phase of growth.
The company is also looking at new ways for businesses to natively interact with ChatGPT consumers. "As more people turn to ChatGPT to explore needs, evaluate options, and make decisions, we see an opportunity to help them discover products and services — and to help businesses of every size grow and thrive," OpenAI said. WATCH: FTC chair on probing Anthropic, OpenAI over recent AI safety incidents watch now
Source: CNBC
