Have a question for ChatGPT but lack a Wi-Fi connection? OpenAI has introduced a new way to connect with its popular AI chatbot for U.S. users: Call 1-800-CHATGPT or 1-800-242-8478.
OpenAI announced the feature on Wednesday and demonstrated how it works through a YouTube livestream. OpenAI researchers called the number with everything from an iPhone to a flip phone to a landline. No matter the medium, the end output was the same: A female voice saying, “Hello again, it’s ChatGPT, an AI assistant. Our conversation may be reviewed for safety. How can I help you?”
In the live demo, ChatGPT helped identify landmarks that a researcher said he saw on a road trip. In another instance, it provided a different researcher with an English-to-Spanish translation so that she could greet a friend’s grandmother in Spanish.
The move to have ChatGPT available via phone call is part of the company’s goal to make AI “as accessible as possible to as many people,” OpenAI product lead Kevin Weil said in the demo video.
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Right now each phone number is limited to 15 free minutes of call time, with no disclosed plans to monetize the feature.
Only U.S. users get to call ChatGPT, but OpenAI also announced Wednesday that global users can access the chatbot by sending the 1-800-242-8478 number messages via WhatsApp. In the demo, ChatGPT offered a recipe for a pesto pasta dinner via WhatsApp and modified it to be vegan at the user’s request.
Both calling and messaging features involve talking to ChatGPT without creating an account.
The OpenAI team built this capability within a few weeks, according to Weil.
“They hustled really hard to ship it and it’s awesome to see it here,” he said.
The feature is one of many announcements that OpenAI has made as part of its “12 Days of OpenAI” event. Other new features released by the company under the same event include opening up ChatGPT Search for all users, free or paid, and releasing its text-to-video generator Sora to the general public.
Related: Is ChatGPT Search Better Than Google? I Tried the New Search Engine to Find Out.
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