Spending less time on ChatGPT? You're not alone.
Worldwide traffic to the popular chatbot continued to fall in June and July, according to Similarweb, which tracks website and app visits.
Similarweb noticed an initial traffic dip a month ago. It now reports the decline “looks like a sustained trend, given that June’s 9.7% drop was followed by a 9.6% decline in July.”
In the US, the drop in traffic was even sharper in June at 15%. In July, traffic then experienced another drop, but only by 4%. (That's also when ChatGPT arrived on Android.)
The big question is why? Similarweb speculates school being out may be a key factor since ChatGPT has become a popular homework assistant for students, along with a way to cheat on essays. “More than one quarter of ChatGPT’s audience falls into the 18-24 age bracket in Similarweb’s website demographics model (which does not include children under 18),” it adds.
So it’s possible traffic to ChatGPT will return this fall when schools reopen. That said, some users have complained that ChatGPT’s capabilities have been dumbed down or restricted in recent months, making it less useful and fun. The complaints made their way to an OpenAI executive, who dismissed them.
“When you use it more heavily, you start noticing issues you didn't see before," OpenAI VP for Product Peter Welinder tweeted last month.
Whatever the case, the “peak has passed” for ChatGPT for now, Similarweb says. The chatbot saw skyrocketing growth in January, making it perhaps the fastest growing app of all time. Meanwhile, OpenAI continues to release new enhancements. On Thursday, the company added some usability improvements, including prompt examples when you start a new chat.