ChatGPT down as thousands report issues worldwide

Thousands of people have reported they are unable to use the world’s best-known artificial intelligence (AI) tool, ChatGPT

Downdetector, which tracks website outages, showed more than 10,000 people reported the AI chatbot, which is made by OpenAI, was not working in the UK on Thursday.

Users attempting to use it were met with a message reading “the web server reported a bad gateway error”.

OpenAI has not yet publicly commented on the outage. The BBC has contacted the firm for comment.

However, many people have taken to social media to highlight the problem and the disruption it is causing them.

The outage began around 11:00 GMT on Thursday, and users continue to report issues.

ChatGPT’s status page said the app had been “experiencing elevated error rates” and the firm was “currently investigating”.

Though many people use the free version of the chatbot, the firm charges up to $200 per month for its various membership tiers.

OpenAI boss Sam Altman said in December that ChatGPT is used weekly by more than 300 million people worldwide.

It comes after tech firms including OpenAI pledged a $500bn (£405bn) investment into AI infrastructure in the US.