In summary
- OpenAI launched the o1 Pro model alongside the ChatGPT Pro subscription, highlighting advanced capabilities for $200 per month.
- o1 promises improvements in reasoning and accuracy, but faces criticism for its speed and high cost for the average user.
- Despite the price, o1 is also available for Plus subscribers, who access GPT-4o with features like DALL-E3 and web browsing.
This Thursday, OpenAI unveiled the latest iteration of its flagship AI model, o1 Pro, along with a new ChatGPT Pro subscription tier that comes with an eye-catching price tag.
This subscription level includes several new features, such as access to OpenAI o1, o1-mini, and GPT-4o, as well as advanced AI voice capabilities. However, the new offering comes with a hefty price tag: $200 a month. By comparison, the previous subscription tier, ChatGPT Plus, costs $20 per month.
“A lot of people, power users of ChatGPT right now, use it a lot and want more computing power than $20 a month can buy,” Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, said in a video presentation. “(The) Pro level has unlimited access to our models and also things like advanced voice mode.”
While Altman stated that o1 is the world’s smartest AI model, he added that the Pro level enhances its capabilities even further.
“These boosts may seem small, but in complex workflows where you’re really pushing the limits of these models, it’s pretty significant,” Altman said.
In a live interview Wednesday with The New York Times’ Andrew Ross Sorkin at the annual DealBook Summit, Altman highlighted ChatGPT’s significant growth since its launch in November 2022.
“We have over 300 million weekly active users,” Altman told the audience. “We have users sending over a billion messages a day to ChatGPT, and we have a very large developer business with 1.3 million developers in the US and many more around the world.”
From Strawberry to o1
OpenAI unveiled o1 in September following weeks of speculation and rumors about codenames like “Strawberry” and “Orion.” The model was considered so advanced that OpenAI decided to adopt a new naming convention, moving away from GPT-3 and 4o to simply use “o1”.
“My colleagues and I at OpenAI are excited to finally share the full o1 model (Strawberry) with all of you,” said OpenAI research scientist Noam Brown in a post on X (formerly Twitter). “You can do better than just counting how many ‘r’s are in ‘strawberry.'”
OpenAI emphasized that o1 is designed to be more efficient in its reasoning, allowing for faster responses.
The model also demonstrates significant improvements by reducing “major errors on difficult real-world questions by 34%” compared to its predecessor. Unlike previous models, o1 takes its time generating responses, effectively “thinking” before responding.
Despite the promising improvements, some ChatGPT subscribers may be hesitant to upgrade to the Pro tier, as the lower-cost ChatGPT Plus tier includes ChatGPT-4o, which already offers access to the Dall-E3 imager and web browsing—a feature not yet available in o1 Pro package.
Initial reviews of Decrypt following the release of o1-preview in September found it slower than the existing 4o model. However, that was when the new model was still in its infancy.
Is it worth the price?
While AI enthusiasts have praised the capabilities of the enhancements offered by ChatGPT Pro, many have balked at the $200 monthly subscription fee, with many considering it too expensive for the average user.
When asked about pricing, OpenAI representatives pointed to existing statements about o1 and the Pro tier, which do not specifically address the cost of the plan. Responding to online questions, Altman clarified that o1 is also available to Plus tier subscribers.
OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Decrypt pricing.
As OpenAI introduces its most advanced tools over the next 11 days in a holiday-themed “12 Days of OpenAI” launch, the debate over the value and accessibility of generative AI may be just beginning.
Edited by Andrew Hayward and Sebastian Sinclair
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