On Thursday, several key artificial intelligence platforms experienced a significant disruption lasting over four hours. The outage affected prominent services like ChatGPT, Sora, and OpenAI’s developer API. Starting at 11 a.m. PT, users encountered difficulties accessing these platforms, with services gradually resuming by 3:16 p.m. PT. This marks the second major disruption in December, raising concerns about reliability and stability. Despite the outage, some services utilizing OpenAI’s API remained unaffected.
Outage Details and Recovery Efforts
The extended downtime began mid-morning on the Pacific coast, impacting numerous users who rely on these AI tools for various applications. By early afternoon, partial recovery was reported, but full functionality had not yet been restored. Users might still face challenges retrieving chat histories or initiating new conversations. OpenAI attributed the issue to an upstream provider without providing additional specifics. The company assured that they are actively working towards a complete resolution.
The outage started abruptly at 11 a.m. PT when many users noticed their inability to access ChatGPT and Sora. By 2:05 p.m. PT, OpenAI announced partial restoration of ChatGPT, although some features remained problematic. Full service for Sora resumed at 3:16 p.m. PT. According to OpenAI’s status page, the root cause was linked to one of their upstream providers. This is not the first time such issues have arisen; two weeks ago, another lengthy outage occurred due to a faulty telemetry system. OpenAI emphasized ongoing efforts to fully restore all functionalities and ensure smoother operations moving forward.
Impact on Users and Related Services
While the primary focus has been on ChatGPT and Sora, other platforms leveraging OpenAI’s API were largely unaffected. Services like Perplexity and Siri’s Apple Intelligence integration continued to operate normally, as confirmed by their respective status updates and independent testing. This selective impact highlights the variability in dependency on OpenAI’s infrastructure among different applications.
The disruption posed challenges primarily for frequent users of ChatGPT and Sora, who may have experienced frustration during critical usage periods. Although this incident is concerning, it is important to note that outages typically last only a couple of hours. However, this recent event, along with the previous six-hour disruption earlier in December, underscores the need for enhanced reliability measures. OpenAI’s commitment to addressing these issues reflects their dedication to maintaining robust and dependable services for all users.
