OpenAI released two AI agents in the past few weeks that can offer ChatGPT users more advanced use of artificial intelligence. They’re called Operator and Deep Research and were unveiled in this order. The two AI agents were available only to ChatGPT Pro users, the most expensive premium plan that costs $200/month.
As a ChatGPT fan, I said I couldn’t wait to get my hands on both agents. But I wasn’t going to pay $200/month for access. Instead, I would wait for the AI agents to roll out to the ChatGPT Plus plan, which costs $20/month.
OpenAI is now ready to make the AI agents available to other ChatGPT tiers, including the Plus, Team, Edu, and Enterprise subscriptions. However, we’re not getting access to the AI agents in the order they were released. Deep Research is the first one to be available to the ChatGPT premium tiers above. Operator is still missing in action, and that’s the ChatGPT AI agent I might use the most right now.
OpenAI announced the Deep Research rollout to ChatGPT Plus, Team, Edu, and Enterprise users on Tuesday. This includes users in the European Union and other non-EU European markets, which I can confirm.
It took a while for the Deep Research rollout to be complete, but I now have access to the Deep Research button in the composer window. From there, I can start a deep research project with one of the ChatGPT models available.
OpenAI also announced a few upgrades for Deep Research since its launch. The mode now supports embedded images with citations and is “better at understanding and referencing uploaded files.”
Also important is an access upgrade for the ChatGPT Pro users. They get 120 Deep Research queries per month, 20 more than the launch phase.
The expanded access and the limit raise indicate that OpenAI is comfortable taking on extra users and improving access for high-paying customers who use Deep Research regularly.
While I’m looking to test Deep Research myself, I’m more interested in access to Operator. This ChatGPT AI agent browses the web for you in a virtual machine and notifies you when it’s done with its chores. This is a feature I might use more than Deep Research, but I’m speculating here, having not used either version.
Operator is still exclusive to ChatGPT Pro users, which must mean OpenAI isn’t comfortable releasing the AI agent more widely. It’s unclear what resources OpenAI needs to make Operator work.
Again, the AI agent browses the web in a virtual browser, which is great for data privacy. You don’t have to give the AI access to your computer or tabs, and you don’t have to stop what you’re doing. Also, you can pass Operator multiple queries, and the AI will work on each of them at the same time, sending notifications when it’s done with each task or when user input is required.
All of that might require extra resources, which would explain why Operator isn’t available to Plus users. That’s just speculation, but OpenAI did say it plans to expand Operator access once it’s confident in its safety and usability at scale.
Until then, Deep Research is going to be available to all premium ChatGPT users, and you can start interacting with this research AI agent right away.
