Booming traffic to OpenAI's ChatGPT posts first ever monthly dip in June -Similarweb (updated)

Similarweb

05/07/2023 17:17

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    By Krystal Hu
       July 5 (Reuters) - ChatGPT, the wildly popular AI
chatbot launched in November, saw monthly traffic to its website
and unique visitors decline for the first time ever in June,
according to analytics firm Similarweb.
    Worldwide desktop and mobile traffic to the ChatGPT website
decreased by 9.7% in June from May, while unique visitors to
ChatGPT’s website dropped 5.7%. The amount of time visitors
spent on the website was also down 8.5%, Similarweb data shows.
    OpenAI did not immediately respond to request for comment.
    ChatGPT set off a frenzied use of generative AI in daily
tasks from writing to coding and reached 100 million monthly
active users in January, two months after its launch.
    It is the fastest-growing consumer application ever, and now
boasts over 1.5 billion monthly visits, one of the top 20
websites in the world. For instance, ChatGPT has far surpassed
Bing, the search engine run by Microsoft  MSFT.O  which uses
OpenAI's technology.
        A few ChatGPT competitors, including Google's  GOOGL.O 
Bard chatbot, have been launched in the past few months. OpenAI
also released the ChatGPT app on the iOS system in May, which
could sap some traffic from its website. Some also tie the usage
change to the summer break for schools, as fewer students look
for help with homework.
  
    The recent slowdown in growth might help control the cost in
running ChatGPT, which requires intensive computing power to
answer queries. Sam Altman, chief executive at OpenAI, has
described the cost of running the services "eye-watering". 
    ChatGPT is free to use but also provides a premium
subscription, where users can pay $20 a month to access OpenAI's
more advanced model, GPT-4. Over half a million people have
signed up for the subscription, according to estimates from
YipitData.
    OpenAI has projected $200 million in revenue this year.
Besides ChatGPT, it makes money by selling API access to its AI
models for developers and enterprises directly and through a
partnership with Microsoft, which invested over $10 billion into
the company.

 (Reporting by Krystal Hu in New York; Editing by David
Gregorio)
 ((mailto:Krystal.Hu@thomsonreuters.com;))