OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently posted on X that the company plans to introduce an updated version of ChatGPT that will support adult-themed conversations, including erotica, for verified adult users starting in December 2025.
"We made ChatGPT pretty restrictive to make sure we were being careful with mental health issues. We realize this made it less useful/enjoyable to many users who had no mental health problems, but given the seriousness of the issue, we wanted to get this right.
Now that we have been able to mitigate the serious mental health issues and have new tools, we are going to be able to safely relax the restrictions in most cases."
Historically, OpenAI had a much conservative stance as earlier versions of ChatGPT were intentionally more restrictive. Altman says that this was by design, keeping mental health concerns in mind.
However, in a conversation with Cleo Abram a few months ago, Altman said, "We haven"t put a sex-bot avatar in ChatGPT yet," acknowledging that such features might increase engagement but were avoided on principle. He further joked about companies potentially making "Japanese anime sex bots" while reaffirming OpenAI’s focus on usefulness and mental health safeguards rather than exploiting vulnerable users.
In another conversation with The Verge, Altman said, "You will definitely see some companies go make Japanese anime sex bots because they think that they’ve identified something here that works. You will not see us do that."
Now that OpenAI claims it has mitigated the serious mental health issues and has new tools, the company will be able to safely relax the restrictions in most cases as part of its “treat adult users like adults” principle.
Altman also added that the new version of ChatGPT will have a personality improvement, similar to what people like about 4o, and that if people want ChatGPT to respond in a certain way, perhaps like a friend, or with more emojis, it should be able to do it.
"In a few weeks, we plan to put out a new version of ChatGPT that allows people to have a personality that behaves more like what people liked about 4o (we hope it will be better!). If you want your ChatGPT to respond in a very human-like way, or use a ton of emoji, or act like a friend, ChatGPT should do it (but only if you want it, not because we are usage-maxxing)."
The updated version would still be the GPT-5 model underneath, but with some adjustments to accommodate these new changes, and is set to roll out to users by December 2025.