When OpenAI launched GPT-5 final week, the corporate mentioned the mannequin would simplify the ChatGPT expertise. OpenAI hoped GPT-5 would act as a type of “one measurement matches all” AI mannequin with a router that might routinely resolve how one can finest reply consumer questions. The corporate mentioned this unified strategy would eradicate the necessity for customers to navigate its mannequin picker — an extended, sophisticated menu of AI choices that OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has publicly mentioned he hates.
But it surely appears like GPT-5 is just not the unified AI mannequin OpenAI hoped it might be.
Altman mentioned in a put up on X Tuesday that the corporate launched new “Auto”, “Quick”, and “Considering” settings for GPT-5 that every one ChatGPT customers can choose from the mannequin picker. The Auto setting appears to work like GPT-5’s mannequin router that OpenAI initially introduced; nonetheless, the corporate can also be giving customers choices to circumnavigate it, permitting them to entry quick and gradual responding AI fashions instantly.
Alongside GPT-5’s new modes, Altman mentioned that paid customers can as soon as once more entry a number of legacy AI fashions — together with GPT-4o, GPT-4.1, and o3 — which have been deprecated simply final week. GPT-4o is now within the mannequin picker by default, whereas different AI fashions will be added from ChatGPT’s settings.
“We’re engaged on an replace to GPT-5’s character which ought to really feel hotter than the present character however not as annoying (to most customers) as GPT-4o,” Altman wrote within the put up on X. “Nonetheless, one studying for us from the previous few days is we actually simply have to get to a world with extra per-user customization of mannequin character.”
ChatGPT’s mannequin picker now appears to be as sophisticated as ever, suggesting that GPT-5’s mannequin router has not universally happy customers as the corporate hoped. The expectations for GPT-5 have been sky excessive, with many hoping that OpenAI would push the boundaries of AI fashions prefer it had with the launch of GPT-4. Nonetheless, GPT-5’s rollout has been rougher than anticipated.
The deprecation of GPT-4o and different AI fashions in ChatGPT sparked a backlash amongst customers who had grown hooked up to the AI fashions’ responses and personalities in ways in which OpenAI had not anticipated. Sooner or later, Altman says the corporate will give customers loads of advance discover if it ever deprecates GPT-4o.
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GPT-5’s mannequin router additionally seemed to be largely damaged on launch day. That prompted some customers to really feel the AI mannequin wasn’t as performant as earlier OpenAI fashions, and compelled Altman to deal with the issue in an AMA session on Reddit. Nonetheless, plainly GPT-5’s router should not be satisfying for all customers.
“We’re not at all times going to get all the things on strive #1 however I’m very happy with how rapidly the staff can iterate,” wrote OpenAI’s VP of ChatGPT, Nick Turley, in a put up on X Tuesday.
Routing prompts to the proper AI mannequin is a troublesome activity that requires aligning an AI mannequin to a consumer’s preferences, in addition to the precise query they’re asking. The router then has to decide on which AI mannequin to ship the immediate to in only a cut up second — that approach, if a immediate goes to a quick responding AI mannequin, the response can nonetheless be quick.
Extra broadly, some individuals exhibit preferences for AI fashions that transcend quick or gradual responses. Some customers could just like the verbosity of 1 AI mannequin, whereas others would possibly recognize the contrarian solutions of one other.
Human attachment to sure AI fashions is a comparatively new idea that isn’t nicely understood. For instance, a whole lot of individuals in San Francisco lately held a funeral for Anthropic’s AI mannequin, Claude 3.5 Sonnet, when it was taken offline. In different instances, AI chatbots appear to be contributing to mentally unstable individuals taking place psychotic rabbit holes.
It appears OpenAI has extra work to do round aligning its AI fashions to particular person consumer preferences.
