As soon as OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, announced it would launch the low-cost plan "ChatGPT Go" in Korea after offering it only in select markets such as India, it was swept up in a pricing controversy. The monthly subscription fee in Korea was set at 15,000 won, about 27% higher than the U.S. price of $8 (about 11,800 won). Critics say the Korean fee is relatively high even considering the strong dollar. OpenAI said, "Prices vary slightly because we set them by reflecting local prices, expense, taxes, and market characteristics by country."
◇ OpenAI expands low-cost plans and even introduces ads to chase Google
According to the artificial intelligence (AI) industry on the 21st, OpenAI recently decided to expand the countries eligible for its low-cost plan worldwide and attach ads to ChatGPT starting in the United States to grow its user base and strengthen profitability. As Google, a latecomer in AI, rapidly attracted new users by pushing its cutting-edge AI model "Gemini 3," OpenAI, sensing a crisis, is speeding up "AI popularization" with low-cost plans, analysts say. Ahead of an initial public offering (IPO) scheduled for this year, it appears to be diversifying its revenue model by placing ads—long delayed as a "last resort"—in the free and low-cost versions of ChatGPT. OpenAI is reportedly expecting about $2 billion (about 2.95 trillion won) in additional revenue this year from introducing ads.
As competition in the Generative AI market intensifies, OpenAI is pursuing a more segmented pricing strategy to maintain its lead in the consumer AI chatbot market. In advanced economies, Google's Gemini is making strong gains, while in emerging markets, Chinese AI corporations are encroaching on the market with free or low-cost AI chatbots. For OpenAI, securing as many users as possible through diverse pricing has emerged as the top priority.
In particular, emerging markets with large populations and significant growth potential require "value-for-money plans" because their income levels are lower than those in advanced economies, making it hard to secure paid subscribers. In fact, after OpenAI introduced "ChatGPT Go" in India last August at $4.57 a month (about 6,700 won), weekly active users jumped by 100 million in a month, from 700 million to 800 million as of Sept. OpenAI's strategy this time is to accelerate "AI popularization" by launching "ChatGPT Go" in advanced markets such as the United States, Europe, and Korea to bring in new users like students with tight budgets and light users who don't use AI chatbots heavily.
If OpenAI's experiment to diversify pricing succeeds, competitors including Google could also roll out ad-based low-cost plans, observers say. Google already runs a low-cost plan priced around $5 a month in some 40 emerging markets, and it may expand it globally to compete with OpenAI. An industry official said, "The key question is whether ChatGPT will lose users to Gemini and Claude due to resistance to ads, or whether it can lower the subscription barrier and expand its user base," adding, "How ads are displayed will likely affect whether users leave or join."
◇ Fiercer competition in the consumer AI chatbot market… ChatGPT expands to four options
Separate from the debate over uniquely high subscription fees in Korea and the addition of ads in ChatGPT, OpenAI's expansion of countries eligible for the low-cost plan has broadened consumer choices compared with before. For ChatGPT alone, there are now four options: the free version; "ChatGPT Go" at 15,000 won a month; "ChatGPT Plus" at $20 a month; and "ChatGPT Pro" at $200 a month.
The newly introduced "ChatGPT Go" is the first paid ChatGPT plan priced at a fixed 15,000 won in Korean won. The most popular "ChatGPT Plus" plan in Korea is priced at $20 (about 30,000 won), so the actual amount paid by individuals varies slightly each month depending on the exchange rate. Korea has the second-largest number of ChatGPT individual paid subscribers after the United States, and most of these subscribers are on the "ChatGPT Plus" plan. An OpenAI official said, "For the time being, we will fix 'ChatGPT Go' at 15,000 won in won terms and keep 'ChatGPT Plus' at $20 in dollar terms."
According to OpenAI, "ChatGPT Go" offers far more instant responses with the latest AI model GPT-5.2 than the free version, and subscribers can send far more messages, upload more files, and generate more images—limits that are 10 times higher than the free version. The free version has a limit of about 10 messages per five hours. Ads in ChatGPT will be applied first in the U.S. market and introduced in Korea about one to two months later. The free version is expected to show more ads than the low-cost plan.
For the most popular "ChatGPT Plus" subscribers, it is designed to allow users to choose among major models, including the most powerful GPT-5.2 Pro, and to perform tasks requiring reasoning such as long-document work, data analysis, and research. It also supports complex image and video generation and the use of coding agents. Response speeds are faster than the free and low-cost versions.
Google's Gemini offers a free version and two paid plans in Korea. The free version of Gemini is equipped with "Gemini 3 Flash," enabling fast responses and simple questions or summaries, but in-depth analysis is limited. The paid plans, "Google AI Pro" and "Google AI Ultra," are priced at 29,000 won a month and 360,000 won a month, respectively, with no price changes even if the won-dollar exchange rate rises. In addition to a range of features based on the cutting-edge "Gemini 3" model, a differentiator is that users get a bundled package of "Google One" cloud storage from 2TB up to 30TB and the work tools "Workspace."
In addition, Anthropic's "Claude Pro" is $20 a month, the same as "ChatGPT Plus," while xAI's Grok is the most expensive despite being the cheapest paid tier, with "Super Grok" at $30 a month, and you must have a social media X account to subscribe.
An official at a domestic software corporations said, "If you use an AI chatbot only a few times a day as a substitute for a search bar, the free or low-cost plans are enough, but for office workers, developers, and researchers who use it continuously for work, paid plans that allow continuous workflows and offer faster speeds are more suitable."