ChatGPT has reached 100 million active users just two months after opening to the public. But data from research firm Similarweb suggests that ChatGPT’s traffic may have peaked.
According to data monitored by third-party site SimilarWeb, global traffic (PV) to ChatGPT’s website and mobile client dropped 9.7 percent in June this year, with traffic in the U.S. dropping 10.3 percent year-over-year. At the same time, the number of unique visitors (UV) to ChatGPT fell by 5.7% and the amount of time visitors spent on the site dropped by 8.5%. This is the first time ChatGPT has experienced negative traffic growth since its launch on November 30, 2022.
In fact, the slowdown in ChatGPT traffic growth has already begun to show momentum in May this year, with a growth rate of 2.8% in May, compared to 131.6%, 62.5%, 55.8% and 12.6% in the first four months of 2023, respectively.
SimilarWeb’s data also shows that Google’s search engine market share increased slightly year-on-year to more than 92%. Microsoft Bing, on the other hand, which uses ChatGPT technology, saw its share of the market drop 0.4 percentage points from a year ago to about 2.8 percent.
The decline in attention for ChatGPT and similar large language models (LLMs) underscores the investment risks faced by companies such as Google and Microsoft, which have poured billions of dollars into the space. In addition, Google, Microsoft and other tech giants such as Nvidia are investing heavily in AI startups.
David Carr, senior insights manager at Similarweb, said the change in traffic indicates the novelty the chatbot brings to the table is wearing off.
OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, has not immediately responded.
If ChatGPT’s app downloads have slowed, it suggests the technology may not be a serious threat to Google’s dominance in search at this point, Bank of America analyst Justin Post wrote in a report.
“As for Google’s stock, the large language model concerns appear to have shifted from market share risk to realization risk, but with search share looking healthy, there may not be much urgency for Google to integrate AI chat into the business.” Post wrote.
The ChatGPT app was released in May and is currently only available for the iphone. according to data.ai, OpenAI for iOS had more than 17 million downloads worldwide as of July 4. The analytics firm said the software was very popular in the U.S., averaging 530,000 downloads per week in the six full weeks after its release, with the peak of downloads occurring on May 31. It began to decline significantly after that.
Bank of America analysts believe that the upcoming OpenAI app for Android may further drive usage of the technology.
However, the recent dip in growth will help ChatGPT control operating costs; after all, answering various questions consumes a lot of computing resources.