GPT-4 Phased Out from ChatGPT - OpenAI Update

GPT-4 Retirement Announced by OpenAI

OpenAI has announced the upcoming retirement of GPT-4, its artificial intelligence model initially released over two years ago. This change will affect its availability within the ChatGPT platform, as detailed in a changelog published on Thursday.

Transition to GPT-4o

Starting April 30th, GPT-4 will be completely superseded by GPT-4o. GPT-4o is currently the standard model utilized in ChatGPT. Users will still be able to access GPT-4 through OpenAI’s API.

OpenAI stated that, in comparative assessments, GPT-4o consistently outperforms GPT-4 across various domains. These include writing, coding, STEM subjects, and more.

Improvements in GPT-4o

Recent enhancements have further refined GPT-4o’s ability to follow instructions, solve problems, and maintain a natural conversational flow. These improvements position it as the logical successor to GPT-4.

GPT-4's Initial Release and Capabilities

GPT-4 was first introduced in March 2023, powering both ChatGPT and Microsoft’s Copilot chatbot. Certain iterations of GPT-4 featured multimodal functionality.

This multimodal capability allowed the model to process and understand both images and text, representing a first for a widely accessible OpenAI model.

Development Costs and Successors

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has previously indicated that the training of GPT-4, known for its substantial size, exceeded $100 million in cost. It was subsequently followed by GPT-4 Turbo in November 2023, a model designed for increased speed and reduced expense.

Legal Disputes

GPT-4 is central to ongoing copyright disputes between OpenAI and several publishers, including The New York Times. These publishers contend that OpenAI utilized their copyrighted data for GPT-4’s training without obtaining proper authorization or consent.

OpenAI maintains that the fair use doctrine provides legal protection against such claims.

Future Model Releases

The retirement of GPT-4 is anticipated to coincide with the release of new models within ChatGPT. Reverse engineer Tibor Blaho reports that OpenAI is preparing a series of models designated GPT-4.1.

This family includes GPT-4.1-mini, GPT-4.1-nano, and the standard GPT-4.1. Additionally, the o3 “reasoning” model, announced in December, and a new reasoning model named o4-mini are also in development.