OpenAI Products Face Major Outage: ChatGPT, Sora, and API Affected

On Wednesday, OpenAI's ChatGPT, Sora, and its developer-facing API encountered a significant outage starting at approximately 3 PM PT, as reported on the company’s status page. By 9 PM PT, most services were restored.

In a tweet, OpenAI confirmed the recovery, stating, “ChatGPT, API, and Sora were down today but we’ve recovered.” However, the root cause of the disruption remains unclear.

During the outage, users attempting to access ChatGPT encountered an error message reading, “ChatGPT is currently unavailable. We have identified the issue and are working to roll out a fix.” Around 7 PM PT, OpenAI indicated that services were gradually coming back online.

Timing of the Outage

The incident coincided with the launch of OpenAI’s integration with Apple Intelligence in iOS 18.2, causing some users to report issues with ChatGPT functionality within Apple’s system. OpenAI clarified that the outage was unrelated to the integration or its ongoing 12 Days of OpenAI event.
According to OpenAI’s developer community lead, Edwin Arbus, the outage stemmed from a configuration change that led to server unavailability.

Challenges with Sora’s Launch

This outage came shortly after the public release of Sora earlier in the week. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman acknowledged that the overwhelming interest in Sora exceeded expectations, forcing the company to limit new user registrations. Many users who successfully signed up experienced issues generating videos, as servers were at capacity.

Broader Context

The disruption occurred on the same day as a global outage affecting Meta’s services and during day five of OpenAI’s 12 Days of OpenAI campaign. This event is part of a series of daily product launches and updates leading up to the holiday season. Thus far, OpenAI has unveiled its o1 reasoning model, a reinforcement fine-tuning research initiative, updates to Canvas, the release of Sora, and the Apple Intelligence integration.
OpenAI referred inquiries to its official tweet, assuring users they are actively resolving the issue while apologizing for the inconvenience.