OpenAI hosted a longer-than-usual press event on Thursday to unveil GPT-5, the ChatGPT upgrade we’ve been waiting for. The new AI model brings performance improvements across reasoning and coding, and it’s smart enough to adapt its approach based on the prompt. It might choose to think longer for some tasks, or provide fast answers for others. GPT-5 will also be able to use the same tools as other versions, including Deep Research, Agent Mode, or Canvas.
GPT-5 will also be the default model for all users with ChatGPT accounts, including ChatGPT Free users. That’s a remarkable accomplishment from OpenAI, which is aiming to make GPT-5 available to as many people as possible. “GPT-5 is the smartest model we’ve ever done, but the main thing we pushed for is real-world utility and mass accessibility/affordability,” Sam Altman said on X. “We can release much, much smarter models, and we will, but this is something a billion+ people will benefit from.” Altman also noted that “most of the world has only used models like GPT-4o” until GPT-5.
GPT-5 is the smartest model we’ve ever done, but the main thing we pushed for is real-world utility and mass accessibility/affordability.
we can release much, much smarter models, and we will, but this is something a billion+ people will benefit from.
(most of the world has…
— Sam Altman (@sama) August 7, 2025
In other words, OpenAI’s most advanced ChatGPT model is available to use for free. All you need to do is create a ChatGPT account, rather than using the AI without logging in. However, free access doesn’t mean you get unlimited use. GPT-5 has hard limits in place, just like other state-of-the-art AI tools OpenAI has released over the years.
What are the GPT-5 limits for OpenAI’s ChatGPT subscriptions?
GPT-5 has started rolling out to ChatGPT users worldwide, but not all ChatGPT users will see it immediately. I can access GPT-5 as a ChatGPT Plus subscriber, but only on mobile. The GPT-5 rollout hasn’t reached the web and iPad versions of ChatGPT at the time of writing.
GPT-5 now rolled out to 20% of paid users and doing >2B TPM on the API! so far so good…
excellent work by the eng and infra teams!
— Sam Altman (@sama) August 7, 2025
Those ChatGPT users with access to GPT-5 will surely want to know what the actual limits are, especially for the Free and cheaper Plus tiers. OpenAI detailed everything in a support document. Here’s what’s available to each type of ChatGPT subscription, according to OpenAI:
ChatGPT Free
- GPT-5: up to 10 messages every 5 hours; beyond this, chats will then use GPT-5 mini.
- GPT-5 Thinking: one message per day.
ChatGPT Plus
- GPT-5: up to 80 messages every 3 hours; beyond this, chats will then use GPT-5 mini.
- GPT-5 Thinking: 200 messages per week; model unavailable after the limit is reached.
ChatGPT Pro and Team
- GPT-5: unlimited access, subject to abuse guardrails.
- GPT-5 Thinking: unlimited access, subject to abuse guardrails.
OpenAI notes that automatic switching from GPT-5 to GPT-5 Thinking happens even if you don’t pick the reasoning model manually. These automatic switches won’t count towards weekly limits. The AI firm also details three types of abuse that won’t be allowed on the Plus and Team tiers, as follows:
- Abusive usage, such as automatically or programmatically extracting data.
- Sharing your account credentials or making your account available to anyone else.
- Reselling access or using ChatGPT to power third-party services.
ChatGPT tools and older models
All your existing ChatGPT conversations will switch to GPT-5 once you get the new model. The AI will determine the best GPT-5 equivalent for your ChatGPT chats. Chats with ChatGPT 4o, 4.1, 4.5, 4.1-mini, o4-mini, or o4-mini-high will continue with GPT-5. ChatGPT o3 chats will move to GPT-5 Thinking. ChatGPT o3-Pro chats will move to GPT-5-Pro, which is exclusive to Pro and Team users.
OpenAI says that when GPT-5 launches, all the other ChatGPT models in the model picker will disappear for Free and Plus users. I can confirm that’s the case in the iPhone app, which now lists only GPT-5 and GPT-5 Thinking for me. ChatGPT Pro, Team, and Enterprise users will still have access to older models via a new legacy model setting.
GPT‑5 is available to all Plus, Pro, Team, and Free users starting today with access for Enterprise and Edu coming in one week. It may take a few days to roll out to all Free users.
– Pro users get unlimited access to GPT-5 & access to GPT‑5 Pro, ideal for the most challenging,…
— OpenAI (@OpenAI) August 7, 2025
The same support document explains that GPT-5 will support all the tools that are available in ChatGPT. The list includes Web search, Data analysis, Image analysis, File analysis, Canvas, Image generation, Memory, and Custom Instructions.
ChatGPT Enterprise and Edu tiers will not get access to GPT-5 for a week, according to OpenAI’s X updates.
