OpenAI has stopped taking new buyers for ChatGPT Pro at 200 dollars a month, citing the load its newest model, Astra, is placing on its machines. Product lead Thibault Sottiaux said that tier creates the heaviest consumer use of the system. Existing Pro accounts keep running. Go, Plus and the programming interface still take new customers. The company has not said when Pro sign-ups resume.
OpenAI has shut the intake for ChatGPT Pro, the 200 dollar a month plan, to new customers. Product lead Thibault Sottiaux pointed to pressure on the company's machines from Astra, its newest model. The Verge and TechCrunch carry the same account: among consumer tiers, Pro is the slice that leans hardest on the system, and cutting new sales is the narrowest move he described for protecting the people already on it.[1], [2]
TechCrunch reports that Astra reached users on 3 September. New buyers can still take Go or Plus, or come in through the programming interface. The company has not named a day on which Pro sales reopen. It also calls growth since Astra the most extreme it has seen, a characterisation the report marks as the company's own.[1]
Accounts that already hold Pro are not touched by the halt. The Verge records Sottiaux saying the lab is adding machines as quickly as it can, and repeats that Pro is the consumer slice that leans hardest on the systems. TechCrunch says existing Pro subscribers keep their access, and presents the cut as a limited intervention that keeps people already inside the service first.[1], [2]
