OpenAI’s ChatGPT hits 900 million weekly active users, TechCrunch reports.

OpenAI’s latest user metrics underscore the chatbot’s rapid ascent from a niche tool to a mainstream platform. The company disclosed that weekly active users have climbed to 900 million, a 12.5 % increase over the 800 million reported in October 2025, according to TechCrunch. The surge brings ChatGPT within striking distance of the coveted one‑billion‑user milestone that has long defined internet‑scale services. The same blog post highlighted that 50 million of those users now pay for premium features, a figure that “accelerated meaningfully to start the year,” with January and February projected as the strongest months for new subscriptions in OpenAI’s history.

The user growth coincides with a historic financing round that could reshape the AI market’s competitive landscape. TechCrunch reported that OpenAI has secured $110 billion in private funding, including a $50 billion commitment from Amazon and $30 billion each from Nvidia and SoftBank, valuing the company at a $730 billion pre‑money valuation. The round remains open, and OpenAI expects additional investors to join, positioning the firm with a war chest large enough to fund next‑generation model development, expanded data‑center capacity, and aggressive talent acquisition.

OpenAI attributes the uptick in engagement to product improvements that become more apparent as scale increases. In its announcement, the company noted faster response times, higher reliability, stronger safety mechanisms, and more consistent performance—all benefits that users reportedly feel “immediately,” per the blog statement cited by TechCrunch. These enhancements are tied to the influx of paying subscribers, whose revenue stream enables continuous model refinement and infrastructure upgrades, reinforcing a virtuous cycle of adoption and quality gains.

Analysts have long warned that user volume alone does not guarantee long‑term dominance, especially as rivals such as Anthropic, Google DeepMind, and a growing open‑source ecosystem vie for enterprise contracts. However, the combination of near‑billion‑scale usage and a $110 billion funding infusion gives OpenAI a distinct advantage in securing compute resources and negotiating strategic partnerships, a point underscored by the involvement of hardware leader Nvidia and cloud titan Amazon in the financing round.

The milestone also signals a broader shift in consumer behavior toward AI‑driven assistance. CNET echoed OpenAI’s claim that ChatGPT is “almost 1 billion weekly users,” suggesting that the chatbot has become a routine tool for learning, writing, planning, and building. As the platform’s user base expands, the data generated will likely feed back into model training, further sharpening the service’s capabilities and cementing its role as a foundational digital assistant for both individuals and businesses.