ChatGPT Ads expands to 26 countries

OpenAI has widened the reach of ChatGPT Ads, taking the advertising product into 26 additional countries. The company says more than 100,000 advertisers have already used the platform, and the latest expansion is meant to help both local businesses and global brands reach consumers while they explore, compare and decide what to buy inside ChatGPT. That shifts the chatbot from a purely conversational assistant into a much larger advertising surface. The move is significant because it brings advertising into a setting where users may expect answers to feel neutral and directly responsive to their questions. OpenAI has argued that ads can be relevant when they match conversational intent, and it has described building an LLM-powered ad stack designed to interpret what a user is trying to accomplish rather than relying only on keywords. In theory, that could make promotions more useful and less intrusive. In practice, it raises hard questions about disclosure, relevance and trust. For advertisers, the appeal is clear: ChatGPT offers a new channel at a moment when people are actively researching products, services and decisions. For users, the risk is that sponsored content could blur the line between an answer and a sales pitch. The success of the expansion will depend on whether OpenAI can keep ads clearly separated from organic responses, avoid manipulating conversational context, and give users meaningful controls. The rollout also intensifies competition in digital advertising, where search engines and social platforms have long dominated intent-based marketing. If ChatGPT can turn conversational queries into a scalable ad business without eroding user confidence, it could become a major new surface. If it fails to maintain trust, the ads could undermine the very assistant experience they are meant to monetize.