OpenAI is shutting down its Atlas web browser

Nine months ago, OpenAI announced the launch of its brand new web browser known as Atlas. Now the AI giant has announced it is sunsetting the product.

OpenAI's James Sun, a member of the product staff, announced a slew of OpenAI updates Thursday. These included the new ChatGPT 5.6 and a new desktop app called ChatGPT Work.

But then at the end of the announcement, Sun revealed that the company was shutting down Atlas — having learned what it could from user behavior. 

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"All these capabilities were built on what we learned from Atlas users who took a leap of faith on a new browser," Sun said. "You taught us how agents can help make browsing and doing work on the open web better, and we are applying these learnings to these new products."

Atlas was the company's bid to build a browser with AI built in, via a ChatGPT integration. Users could prompt ChatGPT to interact directly with the web page they were currently on.

The new ChatGPT Work, meanwhile is basically Atlas plus.

ChatGPT Work focuses on AI agents. For example, users can provide ChatGPT Work with tasks involving documents or files, and the AI assistant will get to work on those tasks in the background. These include both local tasks and online tasks, which can be completed through ChatGPT Work's built-in web browser.

In short, the idea is that ChatGPT Work brings more AI functionality to users' computers, including Atlas' featureset, rendering a standalone web browser unnecessary.

OpenAI's current target date for shutting the Atlas browser down is August 9.