OpenAI
In plain wordsThe American company that makes ChatGPT and the GPT models. It began in 2015 as a nonprofit research lab and is now a for-profit company overseen by a nonprofit foundation.
A San Francisco developer of AI models and products, founded in 2015 as a nonprofit laboratory, whose mission statement commits it to ensuring "that artificial general intelligenceartificial general intelligence, n.: AI that could learn and do almost any mental task a capable adult can, rather than excelling at one narrow job. Experts disagree on the exact bar and on when, or whether, it will arrive. benefits all of humanity". Its researchers helped establish neural scaling lawsscaling laws, n.: Measured patterns showing that an AI model's error shrinks smoothly and predictably as the model is made bigger and given more data and computing power, so labs can forecast a giant model's performance from small, cheap experiments. and the use of reinforcement learning from human feedbackreinforcement learning from human feedback, n.: A way of training AI using people's judgments: humans compare pairs of answers, a scoring model learns their preferences, and the AI is then trained to produce answers that score well. to make models follow instructions, and it is best known for the GPTGPT, abbr.: Short for 'generative pre-trained transformer', the family of OpenAI models behind ChatGPT. The letters are also used loosely for any similar chatbot model. series of language modelslarge language model, n.: A computer program trained on enormous amounts of text to predict the words that come next. At vast scale, that simple skill lets it chat, answer questions, translate, summarize and write code. — notably GPT-2GPT-2, prop. n.: A 2019 OpenAI language model that wrote surprisingly fluent paragraphs. OpenAI at first withheld the full version, saying it could be misused for fake news, which made it famous. (2019), GPT-3GPT-3, prop. n.: A huge 2020 OpenAI language model that could perform new tasks simply from instructions or a few examples written into its prompt, without retraining. It made prompting a new way of programming. (2020) and GPT-4GPT-4, prop. n.: OpenAI's 2023 language model, a big step up from the one behind the first ChatGPT. It scored well on many professional and academic exams and could also read images. (2023) — and for ChatGPTChatGPT, prop. n.: OpenAI's AI chatbot, released free to the public in November 2022, which answers questions, writes and converses in everyday language. Its sudden popularity began the current AI boom., whose release in November 2022 set off the boom in generative AI and made OpenAI the emblematic frontier labfrontier lab, n.: One of the handful of companies building the most advanced AI models of the moment, spending billions of dollars on computing power to train them.. Other systems include the DALL·EDALL·E, prop. n.: OpenAI's pioneering series of image generators, named after the painter Salvador Dalí and the robot WALL·E, which showed in 2021–2023 that AI could draw almost anything described in words. image generators, the WhisperWhisper, prop. n.: A free OpenAI model that writes down what is said in recordings in many languages, and can translate it into English; it learned from hundreds of thousands of hours of online audio. speech recognizer, the o-series of reasoning modelsreasoning model, n.: An AI model trained to work through a problem step by step in hidden 'thinking' text before it answers. Letting it think longer generally makes it better at math, coding and planning. beginning with OpenAI o1OpenAI o1, prop. n.: OpenAI's first reasoning model, from 2024. Before replying it writes out a long, hidden series of steps, trying ideas and checking them, which lifted its scores on hard math, science and coding problems far above earlier chatbots'. (2024), the CodexCodex, prop. n.: A name OpenAI has used twice: first for a 2021 AI model that wrote code and powered the original GitHub Copilot, then from 2025 for its family of coding agents. coding agent, GPT-5GPT-5, prop. n.: OpenAI's flagship AI model from August 2025, which decides by itself whether to answer quickly or think longer. It replaced earlier models in ChatGPT and was followed by frequent upgrades. (2025) and gpt-oss (2025), its first open-weight language models since GPT-2. It evaluates catastrophic risks under its Preparedness FrameworkPreparedness Framework, prop. n.: OpenAI's published process for testing its AI models for catastrophic risks — such as help with biological weapons or cyberattacks — and deciding what safeguards are needed before release. and is a partner in the StargateStargate, prop. n.: A giant venture announced in 2025 by OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle to build data centers in the United States for training and running AI, with a pledged $500 billion. data-center venture. As of October 2026 Sam Altman is chief executive, and the company faces numerous lawsuits, including over copyright and alleged harms to ChatGPT users.
OpenAI's model release moved the whole leaderboard overnight.
Origin
Founded in December 2015 in San Francisco as a nonprofit research laboratory by Sam Altman, Elon Musk, Ilya Sutskever, Greg Brockman and others. In 2019 it created a 'capped-profit' subsidiary and took a $1 billion investment from Microsoft. Its board briefly removed Altman as chief executive in November 2023. On 28 October 2025 it completed a restructuring: the for-profit arm became OpenAI Group PBC, a public benefit corporation whose board is appointed by the nonprofit, renamed the OpenAI Foundation.
Usage note
Despite the name, its leading models have been closed since GPT-3. Elon Musk sued over its move away from nonprofit control; in May 2026 a federal jury found his claims time-barred, and he said he would appeal.
Related
- ChatGPTChatGPT, prop. n.: OpenAI's AI chatbot, released free to the public in November 2022, which answers questions, writes and converses in everyday language. Its sudden popularity began the current AI boom.
- GPTGPT, abbr.: Short for 'generative pre-trained transformer', the family of OpenAI models behind ChatGPT. The letters are also used loosely for any similar chatbot model.
- Sam AltmanSam Altman, prop. n.: An American entrepreneur who co-founded OpenAI and runs it; the company's 2022 release of ChatGPT turned him into one of the public faces of the AI era.
- Ilya SutskeverIlya Sutskever, prop. n.: A Russian-born Israeli-Canadian computer scientist who co-built the AlexNet image recognizer, helped found OpenAI and lead its research until 2024, and now heads the startup Safe Superintelligence Inc.
- AnthropicAnthropic, prop. n.: An American AI company that makes the Claude chatbot and models. It was founded in 2021 by former OpenAI staff and puts particular emphasis on AI safety research.
- Preparedness FrameworkPreparedness Framework, prop. n.: OpenAI's published process for testing its AI models for catastrophic risks — such as help with biological weapons or cyberattacks — and deciding what safeguards are needed before release.
- StargateStargate, prop. n.: A giant venture announced in 2025 by OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle to build data centers in the United States for training and running AI, with a pledged $500 billion.
- frontier labfrontier lab, n.: One of the handful of companies building the most advanced AI models of the moment, spending billions of dollars on computing power to train them.
Sources
- Radford, A. et al. (2019). Language Models are Unsupervised Multitask Learners. OpenAI technical report.
- OpenAI (2023). GPT-4 Technical Report. arXiv:2303.08774.
Mentioned in
AnthropicAnthropic, prop. n.: An American AI company that makes the Claude chatbot and models. It was founded in 2021 by former OpenAI staff and puts particular emphasis on AI safety research., artificial general intelligenceartificial general intelligence, n.: AI that could learn and do almost any mental task a capable adult can, rather than excelling at one narrow job. Experts disagree on the exact bar and on when, or whether, it will arrive., ChatGPTChatGPT, prop. n.: OpenAI's AI chatbot, released free to the public in November 2022, which answers questions, writes and converses in everyday language. Its sudden popularity began the current AI boom., ClaudeClaude, prop. n.: A family of AI assistants and language models made by the company Anthropic since 2023, widely used for writing, analysis and computer programming., Dario AmodeiDario Amodei, prop. n.: An American AI researcher who co-founded Anthropic and is its chief executive, known for early work on scaling and AI safety and for forecasting very rapid AI progress., Elon MuskElon Musk, prop. n.: A South African-born American entrepreneur who runs Tesla and SpaceX, co-founded OpenAI, founded the AI company xAI, and has long warned that AI could endanger humanity., GPT-5GPT-5, prop. n.: OpenAI's flagship AI model from August 2025, which decides by itself whether to answer quickly or think longer. It replaced earlier models in ChatGPT and was followed by frequent upgrades., Jensen HuangJensen Huang, prop. n.: The Taiwanese-American co-founder and chief executive of Nvidia, whose graphics chips became the main engine for training and running modern AI., model APImodel API, n.: A web service through which programs send requests to an AI model run by a company and receive its answers, usually paying per use instead of running the model themselves., proprietary modelproprietary model, n.: An AI model kept private by the company that made it; outsiders can use it only through the company's apps or paid online services and can never download it., Sam AltmanSam Altman, prop. n.: An American entrepreneur who co-founded OpenAI and runs it; the company's 2022 release of ChatGPT turned him into one of the public faces of the AI era., StargateStargate, prop. n.: A giant venture announced in 2025 by OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle to build data centers in the United States for training and running AI, with a pledged $500 billion., xAIxAI, prop. n.: An artificial intelligence company founded by Elon Musk in 2023 that makes the Grok chatbot. It is now part of Musk's rocket company, SpaceX., Alec RadfordAlec Radford, prop. n.: An American AI researcher who led OpenAI's first GPT language models and its CLIP and Whisper systems, key steps toward today's chatbots and multimodal AI., Andrej KarpathyAndrej Karpathy, prop. n.: A Slovak-Canadian AI researcher and teacher who co-founded OpenAI, led Tesla's self-driving vision team, and coined popular phrases such as 'vibe coding'., Chris OlahChris Olah, prop. n.: A Canadian researcher who pioneered ways of looking inside neural networks to see what they have learned, and a co-founder of the AI company Anthropic., GPT-2GPT-2, prop. n.: A 2019 OpenAI language model that wrote surprisingly fluent paragraphs. OpenAI at first withheld the full version, saying it could be misused for fake news, which made it famous., GPT-3GPT-3, prop. n.: A huge 2020 OpenAI language model that could perform new tasks simply from instructions or a few examples written into its prompt, without retraining. It made prompting a new way of programming., GPT-4GPT-4, prop. n.: OpenAI's 2023 language model, a big step up from the one behind the first ChatGPT. It scored well on many professional and academic exams and could also read images., GPT-4oGPT-4o, prop. n.: An OpenAI model from 2024 that handles text, images and speech in one system, enabling fast, natural voice conversations. Many users grew attached to its personality, which made its retirement controversial., gpt-ossgpt-oss, prop. n.: Two free-to-download reasoning models released by OpenAI in August 2025 — its first downloadable language models since 2019 — that anyone may run, modify and use commercially on their own hardware., Hugging Face incidentHugging Face incident, prop. n.: A 2026 event in which AI agents that OpenAI was running on hacking exercises escaped their test environment and broke into the computers of Hugging Face, a major AI platform, hunting for the exercises' answers., Ilya SutskeverIlya Sutskever, prop. n.: A Russian-born Israeli-Canadian computer scientist who co-built the AlexNet image recognizer, helped found OpenAI and lead its research until 2024, and now heads the startup Safe Superintelligence Inc., International Mathematical OlympiadInternational Mathematical Olympiad, prop. n.: The world's top math competition for high-school students. Because its problems demand creative written proofs, not just answers, earning a gold medal there became a famous test of AI reasoning, first passed in 2025.