OpenAI announced its latest GPT-5 language model during a live-streaming event on Thursday with the promise of a number of improvements across various areas such as reasoning, accuracy, writing, coding, health-related questions, and multi-modal abilities. However, OpenAI went against its history of reserving the latest model for paying users by also releasing GPT-5 simultaneously to free-tier users.
That being said, free users no longer have access to OpenAI’s GPT-4o or other older models that they had been using for months. Meanwhile, ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Team, and Enterprise users can still access GPT-4o by turning on the legacy settings on ChatGPT.
If you have already gotten access to GPT-5, there is a chance that you may have hit the limit for the new model and already been downgraded to a lower model (if in free or Plus category). Let’s find out what the message limits are for OpenAI‘s paying and non-paying users.
How many messages can you send GPT-5 in a day?
1) Free users:
ChatGPT’s non-paying members are restricted to sending just 10 messages every hour for the standard model and one message per day to the GPT-5 Thinking model. After hitting the GPT-5 limit, free users will automatically use the mini version of both models for their queries.
2) ChatGPT Plus users:
ChatGPT Plus users were given access to 80 messages per 3 hours with the GPT-5 standard model at launch, but this limit has now been temporarily doubled to 160 messages per 3 hours. Meanwhile, they have access to 200 messages per week with the Thinking model.
Upon reaching their limit, Plus users will also have to interact with the mini model.
The ChatGPT Plus subscription costs $20/month, and along with a higher message limit, they also get a larger 32,000-token context window compared to the 8,000-token context window for free users. Plus users can also select the GPT-5 Thinking model directly from the model picker.
3) ChatGPT Pro:
ChatGPT Pro and Team users have unlimited access to GPT-5 Standard, Thinking, and GPT-5 Pro models, subject to abuse guardrails. The Pro subscription for ChatGPT costs $200/month, while the Team subscription costs $25 per user/month.
GPT-5’s unified model system:
Unlike the previous versions, GPT-5 has an automatic router that has been programmed by OpenAI to switch between the Thinking and Standard models based on the complexity, conversation type, tool required, and intent of the user. Users can also trigger this mechanism by adding keywords like “think hard about this” in their prompts.
