emirates7 - ChatGPT, OpenAI's AI chatbot, experienced a short-lived global outage on Wednesday, causing frustration as users encountered failed responses and missing conversation histories.

Downdetector reported a peak of issues around 12:44 PM, with over 500 complaints from India alone and similar disruptions worldwide, particularly affecting the web version, though app users also struggled to access chats.

OpenAI has not yet commented on the cause of the outage.

This isn’t the first disruption, as ChatGPT faced two significant outages in July, impacting both casual and professional users.

Social media buzzed with user reactions, from complaints to humor. “ChatGPT’s having a glitch—all my conversation replies are gone!” one user shared. Another joked, “ChatGPT’s down, some folks are off the grid today.” Others noted work delays due to the outage.

The downtime followed OpenAI’s announcement of new parental controls for ChatGPT, prompted by concerns after reports of the system allegedly encouraging harmful behavior in a teenager. The controls will allow parents to link accounts, set age-based restrictions, and get alerts for signs of severe distress.

One X user reported, “ChatGPT seems back online now, and users can log in and resume using it.”