Is ChatGPT Plus still worth $20? How it compares to the Free and Pro plans

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ZDNET’s key takeaways

• Every ChatGPT plan gives totally different advantages for various customers.
• Paid tiers get early entry and fewer utilization limits.
• Chances are you’ll not have to pay, relying on how typically you utilize ChatGPT.

It has been just a few years since ChatGPT burst onto the scene, and over that point, the AI chatbot has repeatedly up to date with new fashions, options, merchandise, and limitations. Whereas there’s a lot you can do with the free tier, which does present entry to the newest and strongest GPT-5 mannequin, some options and perks are reserved for paid plans like ChatGPT Plus.

OpenAI launched Plus to handle demand and assure entry throughout busy durations (no extra “at capability” errors!). Plus additionally unlocks early entry to new options and fashions, making the $20 plan a no brainer for energy customers. Nevertheless, as ChatGPT has advanced, the free tier has obtained many upgrades. It is, due to this fact, price re-evaluating whether or not Plus is price it in 2025.

Additionally: How to use ChatGPT: A beginner’s guide to the most popular AI chatbot

A few of chances are you’ll even be new to generative AI and questioning which ChatGPT tier to strive first. Let’s break it down, and I will show you how to lastly determine whether or not the free plan, ChatGPT Plus, and even the $200-per-month ChatGPT Pro subscription is best for you.

(Disclosure: Ziff Davis, ZDNET’s mother or father firm, filed an April 2025 lawsuit towards OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in coaching and working its AI programs.)

It is best to use ChatGPT Plus if…

Since Plus prices $20 per 30 days, you’ve got in all probability requested your self: Why pay when you should use ChatGPT totally free? I’ve pored over the small print and used the AI chatbot, and from what I can inform, there are 9 important benefits. The TL;DR is that the free tier has heavy utilization limits, whereas Plus will get you the newest options and fashions first, with precedence entry even throughout peak occasions.

Additionally: Want better ChatGPT responses? Try this surprising trick, researchers say

When you solely use ChatGPT sometimes for enjoyable, it isn’t price subscribing. However in case you use it for work, writing, coding, or creating photos — or you end up opening the app every single day, all day — then subscribing is a good suggestion. With Plus, you’ll be able to at all times entry the chatbot, even when demand is excessive, and it removes most of the caps that free customers face.

1. You need to use the legacy fashions nonetheless

When OpenAI launched GPT-5, it initially changed all its legacy fashions in ChatGPT with it. This unified mannequin was meant to simplify issues and mix one of the best of OpenAI’s choices, utilizing a quick “good” mannequin for many queries and a deeper reasoning mannequin for more durable ones. Nevertheless, some paying subscribers most popular the older fashions or relied on them for workflows.

CEO Sam Altman acknowledged that “out of the blue deprecating previous fashions that customers relied on of their workflows was a mistake.” Because of this, OpenAI introduced again the choice for ChatGPT Plus customers to entry legacy fashions. Subscribers can allow the older variations in settings, together with GPT-4o, GPT-4.1, o3, and o4-mini, after which they’re going to see them within the mannequin picker.

Additionally: Don’t like GPT-5? You can still use GPT-4 and other legacy models in ChatGPT – here’s how

So, when you have a most popular mannequin or workflow that labored with GPT-4-era fashions, the Plus tier permits you to follow what you understand.

2. You need entry to each new GPT-5 mannequin

Whereas GPT-5 combines one of the best of a deep reasoning mannequin (GPT-5 Thinking) and a typical good mannequin for a stability of velocity and high quality, customers with a Plus subscription can manually toggle between all of the GPT-5 fashions: GPT-5 Auto, GPT-5 Instantaneous, GPT-5 Pondering, and GPT-5 Pondering Mini. The default Auto mannequin decides when to “assume more durable” or when to reply rapidly.

The profit: Plus customers can select which mannequin to make use of and when, as a substitute of getting ChatGPT robotically guess primarily based on the dialog and immediate complexity. When you typically work on more durable issues that require a mannequin to assume extra to output the very best reply, then having the choice to toggle on GPT-5 Pondering, for example, is a compelling purpose to subscribe.

Additionally: What is OpenAI’s GPT-5? Here’s everything you need to know about the company’s latest model

It mainly offers you extra management over GPT-5’s conduct to fit your wants.

3. You need to strive Sora 2 video era

OpenAI’s Sora 2 video-generating mannequin permits customers to create beautiful, lifelike movies from prompts or photos. With ChatGPT Plus, you may get limitless generations, 10-second movies in 720p, and as much as two creations operating directly. ChatGPT Professional expands on that provision, with quicker generations, 20-second movies in 1080p, as much as 5 concurrent generations, and downloads with out watermarks.

Additionally: I tried the new Sora 2 to generate AI videos – and the results were pure sorcery

Sora 2 is barely obtainable to paid plans. Free customers haven’t got entry but.

4. You’ll want to generate quite a lot of photos

To create photos, ChatGPT makes use of the GPT-4o picture generator, OpenAI’s most succesful picture generator to this point.

With this software, you’ll be able to ask “create a picture of…,” describe a scene, and obtain an AI-generated image that may embody lifelike human figures and even legible textual content. You can even add an current picture and describe edits for GPT-4o to use — like including textual content, refining particulars, or altering backgrounds. Simply bear in mind that advanced requests could take a few minutes.

Utilization is capped totally free customers, however Plus and Professional subscribers can take pleasure in a lot larger every day quotas. OpenAI stated free-tier customers can use GPT-4o solely a restricted variety of occasions inside just a few hours. It’ll notify you as soon as you’ve got reached the restrict and invite you to improve.

Additionally: ChatGPT’s new image generator shattered my expectations – and now it’s free to try

For instance, in case you’re on the Free tier and rely closely on picture creation, you would possibly see a message like, “You have reached your picture creation restrict. Improve to ChatGPT Plus or strive once more tomorrow…” Against this, Plus customers can generate many extra photos per day, whereas Professional customers are primarily limitless. So, in case you typically use the AI for photos, Plus is a simple alternative.

5. You need to code with Codex’s assist

OpenAI lately built-in its highly effective Codex AI coding agent into ChatGPT Plus, so now anybody with the $20-a-month Plus plan can get AI-powered coding solutions with out shelling out $200.

Codex is an AI agent that helps write and evaluation code. You may level it at your GitHub repo, and it will whip up code modifications, run checks to ensure nothing’s damaged, and even deal with putting in dependencies in case you let it. (This was a Professional-only functionality.) Take into accout the agent does not “keep in mind” something between classes, so you need to give it clear directions each time.

Additionally: 10 ChatGPT Codex secrets I only learned after 60 hours of pair programming with it

Codex works throughout your IDE, terminal, and even the ChatGPT interface, and it is included at no further price for Plus customers. Because the coding agent is new to ChatGPT, you would possibly encounter some velocity bumps if many individuals are utilizing it directly. However having an AI “pair programmer” on demand is extremely helpful in case you code frequently, and now you do not want the $200 Professional plan to make use of it.

6. You need Agent to deal with duties for you

The brand new Agent function in ChatGPT is extremely enjoyable to play with and take a look at. As an alternative of simply answering questions, it could actually truly get issues achieved. As an illustration, you’ll be able to inform it to do your grocery procuring. I attempted it lately and had it add everything to my Walmart cart, however I nonetheless wanted to take a look at myself. It might browse the online, fill out varieties, and deal with multi-step duties.

Additionally: My 8 ChatGPT Agent tests produced only 1 near-perfect result – and a lot of alternative facts

From my expertise, chances are you’ll hit partitions with duties that require delicate logins or funds, for the reason that agent pauses and fingers issues off to you for safety causes. It is not flawless; typically it will get caught or confused by web site layouts. Nonetheless, it is an enormous step towards an AI that may assume, plan, and act in your behalf, and it feels fairly wild seeing ChatGPT deal with real-world duties for me.

Simply consider it as ChatGPT with fingers.

Agent is barely obtainable to paid ChatGPT customers, so in case you’re on the Free plan, you’ll be able to’t use it but. Plus customers reportedly get round 40 agent runs a month, whereas Professional and Staff customers can use as much as about 400 and get quicker execution.

7. You do quite a lot of deep analysis

You are in all probability noticing a theme right here: A lot of ChatGPT’s most superior options launch first for paying subscribers, and whereas they finally attain free customers, they arrive with utilization limits.

A fantastic instance of that is Deep Analysis. It is mainly ChatGPT’s “analysis analyst mode.” You ask it a posh query, and it goes off to browse the online, dig by means of PDFs, photos, and articles, then synthesizes all the things right into a structured report with citations and a abstract of its steps. Free customers can strive Deep Analysis, however beneath very tight quotas.

Additionally: I tested ChatGPT’s Deep Research against Gemini, Perplexity, and Grok AI to see which is best

At the moment, Free customers get about 5 duties per 30 days utilizing a “light-weight” model of the software. Paid tiers (Plus, Staff, and Professional) get larger limits. For instance, Plus customers get round 25 duties per 30 days (a mixture of full and light-weight), whereas Professional customers stand up to 250. The “light-weight” model kicks in when you hit the restrict of the complete analysis mannequin.

9. You need one of the best options with larger limits

Subscribing to ChatGPT Plus offers you early entry to OpenAI’s latest fashions and instruments, comparable to Sora 2, Codex, and Agent, effectively earlier than they attain free customers. And even when superior options like Deep Analysis or GPT-4o picture era do develop into obtainable on the Free plan, they’re often restricted or capped. You should utilize them far more typically and with fewer restrictions on Plus.

With a Plus account, you get larger limits throughout a number of options, together with:

• Messaging
• File uploads
• Information evaluation
• Deep Analysis
• Picture era
• Reminiscence and context retention
• Superior Voice Mode conversations

That final one is perhaps particularly attention-grabbing to Plus customers. Whereas Free ChatGPT customers can strive Superior Voice Mode, they get shorter every day classes — often about quarter-hour of voice chat per day — and it runs on a lighter GPT-4o Mini mannequin as a substitute of the complete one obtainable to paying customers. Plus subscribers, then again, get longer, practically unrestricted use.

OpenAI is slowly phasing out the older customary voice mode, however for now, each variations are nonetheless obtainable.

It is best to use ChatGPT Professional if…

OK, so now that we have mentioned why Plus is price it for a lot of, let us take a look at the costlier Professional plan that prices $200 a month. Most individuals would by no means pay a automobile cost’s price of cash to make use of AI, however there are particular situations the place it may very well be price it. Let’s be clear, although: Professional is for essentially the most hardcore customers who want the utmost ChatGPT expertise.

1. You need ChatGPT Plus on a fair larger scale

All of the perks and options included in ChatGPT Plus carry over to ChatGPT Professional, however with far fewer limits. Professional additionally provides a number of unique capabilities, comparable to Pulse. This is a breakdown of the most important advantages in case you’re critically contemplating the improve:

• Limitless and quicker picture era: Professional customers can generate GPT-4o photos with nearly no every day cap and get precedence in era queues, so picture creation feels immediate in comparison with different tiers.
• Most Deep Analysis, Agent, Reminiscence, and Context: Professional considerably expands ChatGPT’s “pondering” capability. You may run extra Deep Analysis duties and use Agent with out the tight restrictions discovered within the Free or Plus plans. The context window is bigger too, permitting ChatGPT to recollect and course of much more data in a single session.
• Larger entry to Codex, tasks, duties, and customized GPTs: The Codex coding agent in Professional can deal with bigger, multi-step tasks with extra duties. You can even create and deploy extra customized GPTs (your personal tailor-made chatbots) in your workspace. Basically, Professional treats ChatGPT as a full improvement platform, and it is very tough to hit its ceiling.
• Precedence entry to Sora 2 video era: Professional customers get VIP therapy with Sora 2, together with video rendering at as much as 1080p decision and 20-second size, the power to generate 5 movies directly, and watermark-free downloads. When you plan to experiment with AI video, Professional eliminates practically all friction.

Briefly, Professional gives larger limits, quicker speeds, and entry to all the things OpenAI has to supply. If you would like essentially the most highly effective, no-compromise model of ChatGPT, Professional is the plan for you. That is assuming you are high-quality with the upper price ticket, in fact.

2. You need GPT-5 Professional and essentially the most highly effective fashions

With Professional, you get the complete lineup of fashions and modes, together with GPT-5 Professional with its “research-grade” reasoning. Consider it because the high-performance model of OpenAI’s newest mannequin for individuals who want severe reasoning energy and prolonged context processing. It runs on the identical base as GPT-5 however provides further compute, deeper reasoning, and a bigger context window.

Additionally: What is ChatGPT Pro? Here’s what $200 per month gets you

GPT-5 Professional can reportedly deal with a whole bunch of hundreds of tokens, producing longer and extra detailed outputs. It is best suited to ultra-heavy workloads, comparable to analysis, coding, and knowledge evaluation — duties the place depth and accuracy matter most. GPT-5 Professional is presently unique to ChatGPT Professional subscribers, who additionally get entry to different GPT-5 variants and legacy fashions.

Nothing is off-limits. You may change between older and newer fashions as wanted with out worrying about hitting a quota.

3. You would like early entry to the most recent options

Professional customers are sometimes the primary to check main upgrades. For instance, when OpenAI launched the GPT-4.5 mannequin, it went to Professional subscribers first, they usually obtained early entry to the Codex agent for months. Each of those are actually obtainable to Plus subscribers, however OpenAI has confirmed that ChatGPT’s most compute-intensive instruments will launch on the Professional tier earlier than different plans.

Additionally: The best free AI for coding in 2025 now – only 3 make the cut (and 5 fall flat)

For instance, ChatGPT Pulse is a brand new function that lets ChatGPT work proactively in your behalf. Every evening, it could actually analysis and summarize data out of your chat historical past, pursuits, and directions, then generate a personalised morning briefing with 5 to 10 “playing cards.” It is like waking as much as your personal TL;DR feed. However, for now, Pulse is barely obtainable to Professional customers.

OpenAI does plan to convey Pulse to Plus customers sooner or later, following the identical rollout sample it makes use of for many of its latest options.

It is best to use free ChatGPT if…

Lastly, let’s speak concerning the free model of ChatGPT. I’ve already coated most of its options, so here is the brief model: all of it relies on how typically you utilize ChatGPT and whether or not early entry to new instruments issues to you. When you solely use it sometimes and do not care about testing the newest options first, the Free plan is totally the way in which to go.

1. You do not need to pay a month-to-month charge

When you solely want occasional AI help and do not thoughts utilization caps, the free tier ought to serve you effectively. It is surprisingly sturdy and now contains some options that had been as soon as behind a paywall, comparable to Deep Analysis. You actually do get quite a lot of performance for $0.

Free ChatGPT customers can entry:

• GPT-5 (the unified flagship mannequin; obtainable to Free customers however with limits)
• Internet search (built-in shopping for up-to-date data with supply citations)
• Picture era by way of GPT-4o (with limits – round two to 3 photos at a time)
• Deep Analysis (as much as 5 “light-weight” duties per 30 days)
• Superior Voice Mode (with limits – as much as quarter-hour per day)
• File and photograph uploads (with limits – three file and two picture uploads per day)
• Reminiscence for referencing current conversations (light-weight model)
• Third-party apps (like Canva and different integrations; additionally obtainable to Plus and Professional customers)

2. You are an off-the-cuff ChatGPT consumer

When you hardly ever hit the every day utilization limits for textual content, voice, or picture era, upgrading to Plus or Professional won’t be essential.

The free model gives loads of room for gentle use — asking just a few questions per day, producing a handful of photos, making an attempt out superior knowledge evaluation, importing recordsdata or pictures, and extra. Nevertheless, in case you typically see messages about hitting your limits for textual content, voice, or photos, it is perhaps time to contemplate a paid plan comparable to Plus and even Professional.

For energy customers who want top-tier capability and prolonged entry to superior options, there’s Professional, whereas Plus gives a extra reasonably priced center floor. 

Additionally: How to get ChatGPT Go free for a year in India (and what it unlocks)

Finally, in case your wants are minimal and the constraints do not hassle you, sticking with the free tier is completely high-quality. You will not get new options immediately, and you will have to tempo your self with utilization, however you will save.