OpenAI Pushes GPT-5.5 Instant as ChatGPT Default Model With Tighter Personalization

OpenAI on Monday, May 5, 2026 made GPT-5.5 Instant the new default model for ChatGPT, replacing GPT-5 Instant for free-tier users and updating the routing rules for paid users, per OpenAI’s announcement and TechCrunch’s coverage. The company says Instant is faster, more accurate on everyday questions and visibly less effusive — 9to5Mac highlighted that the update specifically dials back gratuitous emoji and over-formatted answers that users had complained about for months.

The bigger product change is in personalization. GPT-5.5 Instant now draws on a user’s past chats, uploaded files and — for Plus and Pro users on the web — a connected Gmail account to write more tailored responses. OpenAI says the personalization layer rolls out first on web for Plus and Pro, lands on mobile shortly after, and will expand to Free, Go, Business and Enterprise tiers in the coming weeks. Enterprise administrators can scope or disable the integration via tenant-level controls.

Instant is the lighter sibling of GPT-5.5, which OpenAI announced on April 23 and which sits in the API at $5 per 1M input tokens and $30 per 1M output tokens with a 1M-token context window. GPT-5.5 Pro is also live for Pro, Business and Enterprise users in ChatGPT and on the API. The May 5 swap is OpenAI’s first ChatGPT-default change since the GPT-5 era, and it lands a day before Anthropic’s Code with Claude conference in San Francisco — a deliberate cadence in what is now an almost weekly back-and-forth at the frontier.