A significant global outage affected OpenAI's ChatGPT on October 6, 2025, leaving thousands of users in India, the US, and other countries unable to access the popular AI chatbot. The service disruption began at approximately 1:04 PM IST and impacted both web and mobile app platforms. According to Downdetector, over 770 reports were recorded within an hour of the initial problems, with the disruption affecting users globally.
Users across platforms reported encountering various error messages, including "Error in message stream" and "Something went wrong while generating the response." Frustrated users took to social media to express their concerns, with some joking about being forced to use their own brains. Professional users were particularly affected, with many relying on ChatGPT for tasks such as content creation, research, and problem-solving.
The outage highlighted the extent to which ChatGPT has become integrated into daily workflows, particularly in education and content creation. Students and professionals experienced disruptions, with some facing challenges in meeting deadlines. The incident raised questions about the scalability of AI service infrastructure, global redundancy, and failover systems, as well as communication protocols during service disruptions.
The global reaction to this outage underscores the growing dependence on AI-powered tools for various tasks. As AI tools continue to evolve and integrate deeper into daily operations, the need for robust infrastructure, clear communication during outages, and contingency planning becomes increasingly apparent. OpenAI has not issued an official statement regarding the root cause of the outage or steps being taken to prevent future occurrences.
