OpenAI is rapidly expanding its affordable ChatGPT Go plan, which costs under $5, to 16 new countries across Asia. The subscription tier is now available in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, East Timor, and Vietnam.
In select countries such as Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Pakistan, the company is allowing users to pay in local currencies. In the remaining countries, users must pay in USD at a price of approximately $5, with the final cost varying based on local taxation.
ChatGPT Go gives users higher daily limits for messages, image generation, and file or image uploads per day. The plan also offers twice as much memory as the free plan, enabling more personalized responses.
According to OpenAI, the expansion comes as the company has seen its weekly active user base in Southeast Asia grow by up to 4x. The plan was first launched in India in August , followed by Indonesia in September . OpenAI reports that paid subscribers in India have doubled since the launch.
OpenAI is competing with Google to make affordable AI chatbot subscription plans available in more regions. Google launched its similarly priced Google AI Plus plan in Indonesia in September , followed by expansion to over 40 countries . The Plus tier gives users access to Gemini 2.5 Pro, Google’s most advanced AI model, along with creative tools for image and video creation — including Flow (for design), Whisk (for image remixing), and Veo 3 Fast (for video creation) — as well as 200GB of cloud storage.
The expansion comes at a pivotal moment for OpenAI. At its DevDay 2025 conference this week in San Francisco, CEO Sam Altman announced that ChatGPT has reached 800 million weekly active users globally, up from 700 million in August. The company also unveiled a major platform shift, introducing apps that work directly inside ChatGPT and that transform the chatbot into an ecosystem that’s similar to an app store, with partners like Spotify, Zillow, and Coursera, among others .
“The evolution we’re trying to make over the next few years is one where ChatGPT itself is more like an operating system where you can come and use applications,” the head of ChatGPT, Nick Turley, told TechCrunch , regarding the development on the sidelines of the event. “If you want to write, there’s an app for that. If you want to code, there’s an app for that. If you want to interact with goods and services, there are applications for you.”
Despite OpenAI’s rapid growth and recent $500 billion valuation, the company reported a $7.8 billion operating loss in the first half of 2025 as it continues spending heavily on AI infrastructure. The company’s affordable subscription tiers, like ChatGPT Go, are seen as an important step toward achieving profitability while expanding its global user base, particularly in high-growth markets across Asia where both OpenAI and Google are aggressively competing for market share.
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Ivan covers global consumer tech developments at TechCrunch. He is based out of India and has previously worked at publications including Huffington Post and The Next Web.
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