OpenAI Delays Rollout of AI Image Features for Free Users Due to High Demand

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced on Wednesday that the company is delaying the rollout of ChatGPT’s viral new AI image features to free users, citing unexpectedly high demand.

"Images in ChatGPT are wayyyy more popular than we expected (and we had pretty high expectations)," Altman posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday.

The company initially unveiled the GPT-4o’s native image generation feature on Tuesday, allowing users to upload and modify images directly in ChatGPT. While OpenAI promised that the feature would be available across all tiers, as of Wednesday, it remains limited to subscribers of ChatGPT Pro, Plus, and Teams.

This isn’t the first time OpenAI has faced challenges with product launches. In recent months, the company has frequently pointed to insufficient compute capacity as a major issue. After launching its text-to-video tool Sora in December, OpenAI had to disable signups due to overwhelming demand. The company's proposed $500 billion Stargate data center project may eventually alleviate these capacity issues.

While free users eagerly await access to the new AI image features, OpenAI’s current focus appears to be ensuring stable performance for its paid subscribers. Further updates on the feature rollout are expected as the company addresses its infrastructure challenges.