- Operai has just revealed the biggest chatgpt use survey in history
- According to the findings, 70% of chatgpt users use it outside work
- The survey was conducted by the OpenAI economic research team and Harvard David Deming economist
Open AI has just revealed the results of its largest chatgpt use study to date, and ideas about how people interact with the chatbot of AI are fascinating.
By revealing the study in his blog, Openai broke the results in three key conclusions: who is using chatgpt, why they are using it and how the use of AI evolves over time.
The study was conducted by the OpenAI economic research team and Harvard David Deming economist for the National Economic Research Office (NBER).
While Future (Techradar’s parent company) has conducted its own research in the past that has given a great idea of the use of the largest population, obtaining information directly from the creators of the world’s most popular tool offers an excellent vision.
Here are three things we learned from the world’s biggest study in Chatgpt and how people use it.
1. The use gaps are closing
According to Openai, the gender gap of users who take advantage of the chatgpt has been dramatically closed over the years. Previous investigations in January 2024 showed users who had names that it was possible to classify as masculine or female, 37% had “typically female names.”
As of July 2025, however, that figure is 52%. Now, I have my doubts about how Operai can really determine the genre of a user who interacts with Chatgpt, but taking into account the massive influx with the same criteria, it is fair to say that there is a gender gap much less related to the AI than ever.
In other places, Openai informs that the adoption rate in lower income countries is 4 times faster than the richest.
2. How people use chatgpt
According to Openai, the main reason why people use chatgpt is to do things, and “the three quarters of the conversations focus on practical orientation, the search for information and writing.”
Operai broken down how people use chatgpt in three categories: ask, make and express. The study states that almost half of all Chatgpt consultations are “asking”, where a user with AI to obtain advice. 40% of the use is “making” as “text writing, planning or programming”, and 11% of the use is “expressing”, focused on “personal reflection, exploration and game.”
While this breakdown might not surprise you, I think it is interesting to see that writing is, in fact, the most common work task for which people use chatgpt. Honestly, that does not fill me with much hope, especially considering that I spend hours and hours of my day writing without help from AI.
3. Mostly play, less work
This part of the study is the most intriguing, in my opinion. In fact, I am really quite surprised by the results. Operai states that 70% of people use chatgpt in a way not related to work, and the study indicates that “Chatgpt helps improve trial and productivity.”
Without this study, he would have believed that most people use chatgpt in a work -based environment, specifically for worldly tasks that do not require much brain power. Instead, it seems that users are interacting with Chatgpt after the office closed and in their free time, highlighting how much AI has managed to infiltrate our daily lives.
You can read the full document with even more statistics on the NBER website. What result of this survey finds the most interesting? Let us know in the comments below.
