ChatGPT Ads Are Now Live in the UK — Here's What Free Users Need to Know
OpenAI has rolled out ads in ChatGPT for UK Free and Go plan users, with personalisation controls, data deletion options, and a firm ad-free guarantee for paid tiers.
OpenAI confirmed on 6 June 2026 that its ChatGPT advertising pilot is now active in the United Kingdom, making the UK the first European-regulated market where ads appear in the chat interface. The rollout covers Free and Go plan users. If you’re on a paid plan, nothing changes for you.
The ads experiment started in the United States on 9 February 2026. The UK follows Australia, New Zealand, and Canada as part of a phased, market-by-market expansion. Zalando and Dentsu are among the named launch partners for the UK pilot.
Who sees ads, and where do they appear?
Ads are currently live for logged-in adult users on the Free and Go plans in the UK, US, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. The placement is straightforward: a single sponsored unit can appear below a ChatGPT response when there’s a relevant match to what you’re discussing. Ads are clearly labelled as sponsored and visually separated from the model’s answer. They don’t appear inside the ChatGPT Atlas browser during this test period.
Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, and Education accounts will not see ads. OpenAI has been explicit that it will always offer a paid tier that is ad-free. That’s a firm commitment, not a footnote.
How does targeting work?
OpenAI starts with what you’re discussing in your current chat thread and matches that to relevant advertiser categories. The targeting system uses a free-text “context hints” field rather than a traditional keyword auction. Advertisers describe the types of conversations or scenarios where they want their product to appear, and OpenAI’s ad-ranking system decides when to surface it.
If you have Personalised Ads enabled, the system can also draw on past chats and how you’ve previously interacted with ads, such as which ones you’ve hidden or engaged with. If personalisation is off, targeting relies only on the current conversation, your general location, and your language settings.
One thing worth noting for UK users specifically: because the UK falls under OpenAI’s EU advertising policy, personalisation requires explicit consent before it activates. That gives UK users a stronger opt-in position than users in the US, where the default is less restrictive.
Your controls
OpenAI has built several controls directly into the ad experience.
Dismissing an ad: You can hide any ad mid-conversation using the “Hide ad” option. You can also share feedback or find out why a particular ad is being shown to you.
Deleting your ad data: You can delete your ads history and interests data with one tap. This clears the data used to personalise ads without touching your actual chat history. Deleted ad data is retained on OpenAI’s servers for up to 30 days before being fully removed, and it stops being used for targeting immediately.
Toggling personalisation: Turning off “Personalise ads” makes ads less tailored but does not remove ads from the interface. You can also disable the “Past chats and memory” toggle, which stops your chat history and saved memories from contributing to ad relevance. If you want to chat with no ad data collected at all, Temporary Chat is the cleanest option.
It’s worth being clear about what these controls do and don’t do. None of them remove ads entirely if you’re on a Free or Go plan. They adjust the basis on which ads are selected. The only way to stop seeing ads in ChatGPT is to move to a paid tier.
What advertisers can and cannot see
This is probably the question most people have. The short version: advertisers get aggregate performance data, nothing else.
Advertisers receive information like total impressions, clicks, click-through rate, and conversion data where they’ve set up conversion tracking. That’s it. OpenAI does not share individual conversations with advertisers, does not sell user data, and explicitly prohibits advertisers from accessing chat history, memories, your name, email address, precise location, IP address, or any sensitive information including health, mental health, or political topics.
Ads also have no influence on ChatGPT’s answers. The ad system runs on entirely separate infrastructure from the chat model. Advertisers cannot shape, rank, or alter what ChatGPT says in response to any query.
Ads are not eligible to appear near sensitive topics, including personal health, mental health, or politics. And during this test, OpenAI will not show ads to users it identifies or predicts to be under 18.
Why is OpenAI doing this?
The practical reason is straightforward. Running ChatGPT at scale for hundreds of millions of free users is expensive. Advertising gives OpenAI a way to sustain and expand free access without changing how the product works. OpenAI has projected $2.5 billion in advertising revenue for 2026, and the ads business reportedly crossed $100 million in annualised revenue within six weeks of the US launch.
Early data from the US pilot, as of late March 2026, showed no impact on consumer trust metrics and low dismissal rates. OpenAI has described this as an ongoing test, with improvements to ad relevance continuing as it gathers feedback.
What this means for you
If you’re a UK user on the Free or Go plan, you’ll start seeing occasional sponsored units below ChatGPT responses. They’ll be labelled, they’ll be relevant to your conversation, and you can dismiss any that aren’t useful. Your actual conversations remain private. Advertisers don’t see them.
If you’re on Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise, or Education, nothing changes.
If you want more control over how ads are personalised, head to Settings and review the Personalised Ads and Past Chats and Memory toggles. If you want to chat without any ad data being collected, use Temporary Chat.
The full user-facing FAQ is available on the OpenAI Help Center if you want to dig into the specifics.