Updated Friday August 8, 5:21 pm ET: After this post was published, OpenAI co-founder and CEO Sam Altman revealed that the company will reinstate access to GPT-4o and other older models for selected users, acknowledging the GPT-5 launch was “more challenging than we anticipated.”

Upon announcing the debut of its latest flagship model family, GPT-5, OpenAI stated that this model will be the driving force behind all of ChatGPT, and that the current models on the chat platform will be phased out. 

A spokesperson from OpenAI informed VentureBeat that GPT-5 “will replace all other models in ChatGPT, so users won’t need to choose based on each task, which will be implemented once you have access to GPT-5.” This indicates that people will no longer have the option to select GPT-4o, o3, o4-mini, or o4-mini-high. 

With GPT-5 access being gradually provided to ChatGPT Plus, Free, Pro, and Team users, only the Enterprise and Edu tiers will retain the ability to use the “legacy” models for an additional 60 days. 

This announcement took many ChatGPT users by surprise, as they had become accustomed to relying on their preferred models for daily queries. Some users expressed that the transition will require an adjustment period, primarily because their workflows were based on how the model interacted with them or typical response times.

Some users mentioned they had developed “a connection” with their selected model and found a demo in the livestream announcement, where GPT-4o was asked to write its own eulogy, to be in poor taste. The discontinuation of GPT-4o resulted in the most disappointment. After all, 4o was the default model for ChatGPT, and many users either preferred it or never considered switching models because it suited their needs.