# A milestone in expanding access to AI

The ad platform reached a $1 billion annualized revenue run rate in under 200 days and is currently available in over 40 countries.

- Direct self-service ad purchasing via Ads Manager is now live across India, Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa
- Ad targeting uses the context of active conversations and optional broader user account history depending on settings and jurisdiction
- Ads are labeled separately and do not influence generated model responses or grant advertisers access to private chats

## Why it matters

Marketers in Europe, India, and MENA can now buy and target conversational ads directly on ChatGPT's free tier without working through sales representatives.

## Sources

- [OpenAI: A milestone in expanding access to AI](https://openai.com/index/expanding-access-to-ai-with-chatgpt-ads)

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Summarized by dstilled on 2026-08-31. https://dstilled.ai/story/2b33467f-1d95-46fa-b111-0f9d0eb0faa7