Understanding ChatGPT Work
thirtieth August 2026
OpenAI introduced ChatGPT Work on July ninth, and have been furiously iterating on it ever since. It’s a very complicated and really highly effective product. Right here’s what I’ve discovered about it thus far.
ChatGPT Work is definitely two merchandise
The extra attention-grabbing model of ChatGPT Work is the one which runs within the cloud. This may be accessed through chatgpt.com or by means of the ChatGPT cellular apps. Let’s name it Work Cloud.
If you happen to set up the ChatGPT desktop app—the app that was known as Codex—you acquire entry to a factor known as ChatGPT Work that may entry information and run applications straight in your laptop. Let’s name that one Work Native. This one feels extra like common Codex re-skinned to be much less intimidating to non-software-developers.
(Replace: Work Cloud can be accessible from the ChatGPT desktop app, through a The place ought to this chat run? dropdown.)
For the remainder of this text I’m going to speak solely about Work Cloud.
Work is for paid subscribers solely
Proper now, ChatGPT Work (in each flavors) is accessible solely to $20/month and up subscribers. Free customers and $8/month Go customers do not need entry.
Work has options that aren’t accessible in Chat
The interface for accessing Work is a tab selector, which presents it as a substitute for Chat:
The plain query is when ought to I exploit Chat, and when ought to I exploit Work?
OpenAI’s official reply to that query is:
Use Chat once you need a solution, rationalization, brainstorm, or quick draft. Use ChatGPT Work once you need ChatGPT to finish a job with a transparent final result, corresponding to a short, deck, evaluation, recurring replace, workflow, or file you possibly can overview and use.
I discover that just about completely ineffective, as a result of I’ve been utilizing common ChatGPT Chat for all of these job classes for years!
The higher query then is what options does Work have which are lacking from Chat?
After intensive experimentation I feel I’ve principally figured that out:
Mannequin choice
In Work, you get the choice to select GPT-5.6 Sol, Luna, or Terra, every with Gentle, Medium, Excessive, Additional Excessive, Max, or Extremely reasoning ranges. You may also choose GPT-5.5 at Gentle, Medium, Excessive, or Additional Excessive.
These look to be the identical fashions which are accessible by means of the OpenAI API.
Chat presents a distinct choice: 5.6 Prompt, Medium, Excessive, Additional Excessive, and Professional (really Additional Excessive and Professional are solely accessible for $100/month+ subscribers—$20/month subscribers cap out at Excessive). It doesn’t clarify if these are Luna or Terra or Sol (I’m assuming Sol?). 5.6 Professional seems to be unique to Chat, with no equal in Work.
My present understanding from utilizing Codex is that Extremely is a particular mode that extra eagerly delegates to sub-agents.
I imagine ChatGPT Work periods are billed towards your Codex allowance, whereas ChatGPT Chat Periods get their very own, separate allowance. This will assist clarify the mannequin availability variations.
Code execution with Web entry!
As a long-time fan of the Code Interpreter sample—pioneered by OpenAI in 2023—that is by far essentially the most thrilling function of ChatGPT Work (Cloud) for me.
The code execution surroundings can now discuss to the remainder of the web!
ChatGPT Chat can’t do that—in the event you ask it to put in further software program packages or work together with web sites or APIs that entry might be blocked by the container proxy.
(Weirdly, again in January it grew the flexibility to put in packages, however that doesn’t appear to work any extra. I want that they had higher changelogs!)
Claude’s equal container has allowed restricted web entry because it launched final September. Claude can set up packages from PYPI and NPM and clone repositories from GitHub. However that’s about it: the allowlist of domains may be very quick.
ChatGPT Work permits a complete lot greater than that. It may be configured with a selected listing of allowed domains, however the default seems to be open to all.
This makes Work an extremely great tool. You may have it clone GitHub repositories, set up their dependencies, then use them to work together with the remainder of the net!
A full, headless Chrome browser
One other killer function of ChatGPT Work is the browser device. ChatGPT Work can launch a full Chrome occasion, load web sites, fill out varieties, and take screenshots.
If a web site requires signal within the browser can immediate you to take over and enter each passwords and 2FA codes, with out round-tripping these credentials by means of the mannequin itself.
It could actually even run JavaScript towards the DOM of loaded pages. I prompted:
Load simonwillison.web in your browser and extract the headings utilizing JavaScript
ChatGPT Work fired up a browser occasion and ran the code:
return Array.from(doc.querySelectorAll(“h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6”), heading => ( null
));
});
This feels loads like my shot-scraper javascript device, solely now I can entry it on my telephone!
A persistent, shared filesystem
ChatGPT Chat will get a recent filesystem for every chat session. These can’t be accessed from every other session.
In ChatGPT Work every session will get its personal scratch folder—named one thing like /workspace/scratch/e00a0a017944—however every of these are persevered throughout periods, so you possibly can entry information from earlier chats. I’ve 171 folders in /workspace/scratch proper now!
So far as I can inform that /workspace quantity is mounted to all Work periods which are at present operating—file edits from one might be immediately seen by the others. They don’t appear to share the identical course of area although, and localhost servers operating in a single can’t be accessed from one other.
ChatGPT Websites
ChatGPT Work has the flexibility to construct and deploy total web sites, utilizing Cloudflare Employees. These can have HTML and JavaScript and might run server-side options too, together with stateful options on high of Cloudflare D1 and R2.
Right here’s a easy web site I constructed with this function:
london-pelicans-in-her-piety.simonw.chatgpt.web site
My immediate was:
Work out the entire locations in London with a pelican in her piety, then flip that right into a JSON file and construct a ChatGPT websites web site about them
(A pelican in her piety is an interesting piece of medieval Christian imagery—as soon as you already know about them you’ll discover them everywhere.)
These websites default to being non-public to the consumer that created them, however you can also make them public and (on group plans) share them with different particular people.
Sub-agents with Sol, Luna, and Terra
There’s not a lot to say about this one. ChatGPT Chat can’t run sub-agents. ChatGPT Work can. That is very a lot a power-user function: if you’re operating a posh undertaking that may profit from a number of parallel brokers working collectively, Work can try this.
Scheduled immediate automations
One other function that appears to have migrated from common ChatGPT to ChatGPT Work sooner or later. You may immediate ChatGPT Work like this:
run a search to see if Waymo have introduced a launch date for Half Moon Bay day-after-day at 8am
This can schedule a immediate to run on that frequency. These prompts can resolve that nothing attention-grabbing has occurred, or they’ll resolve to inform you of some new data.
Replace: Truly this appears to work in ChatGPT Chat as nicely.
It’s nonetheless price noting right here although, as it may be used together with different ChatGPT Work unique options. You may set a scheduled job to replace a ChatGPT Website on an hourly foundation, for instance.
Is that this protected?
An open query for me proper now could be how protected all of these things is.
My deadly trifecta mannequin warns in regards to the dangers inherent in any agent system that mixes entry to non-public information with publicity to untrusted content material and a solution to talk stolen data again to an attacker.
ChatGPT Work combines all three!
I’d love to listen to extra from OpenAI about how they shield ChatGPT Work periods towards immediate injection assaults. I anticipate their reply is identical auto-review mechanism as Codex.
OpenAI may make this loads much less complicated
Figuring this all out took far more work than it ought to have.
I feel there are two key issues right here:
OpenAI clarify Work by way of what it’s for, not what it really does
OpenAI nonetheless insist on hiding their system prompts and instruments descriptions
If the ChatGPT Work documentation included the precise system immediate and power descriptions utilized by the agent I wouldn’t have wanted to write down this put up.
An inventory of all of the instruments
Shortly after publishing this text I had an thought. I began a recent Work session and prompted:
Construct a web site that lists each one in every of your instruments – almost grouped into classes – and for each clarify what it does. Attempt to precisely duplicate arguments and power descriptions the place attainable. Design aesthetic must be technical docs, minimal flare
Right here’s the positioning it constructed, which incorporates particulars of 223 registered instruments—although 6 of these are from my very own private MCPs served through datasette-mcp.
And a complete lot of Abilities
I seen that the one browser-related device within the listing was net.run, which has strategies for operating searches, opening URLs, and clicking hyperlinks, however didn’t appear like the total story with regard to headless browser automation.
This made me suspicious that one thing was lacking, so I advised the ChatGPT Work session that constructed that instruments reference web site:
Add full copies of each talent to the web site (separate pages linked to from the homepage)
It seems ChatGPT Work makes use of plenty of abilities—44 actually!
The control-browser talent explains how the browser works:
Run browser setup code by means of the Node REPL js device. On this surroundings the callable device id sometimes seems as mcp__node_repl__js. […]
The power to work together straight with the browser is uncovered by means of the browser-client runtime through the agent.browsers.* API. Earlier than making an attempt to work together with it, you MUST emit and skim the whole documentation returned by await browser.documentation() in a single go.
So I advised Work:
Add the total output of await browser.documentation() to the underside of the /abilities/control-browser web page
And now you possibly can learn that on /abilities/control-browser as nicely.
A number of extra attention-grabbing Abilities:
