CEO Sam Altman announces free premium ChatGPT for college students in the US and Canada throughout May

In a strategic move to strengthen its position in the education sector, OpenAI has made its premium ChatGPT Plus subscription available for free to college students across the U.S. and Canada through the end of May.

This announcement, which came on Thursday, provides students with free access to the $20-per-month service just as they prepare for finals.

The offer grants access to GPT-4o, image generation, voice interaction, and advanced research tools that are unavailable to users of the free version, potentially offering significant academic advantages during a critical time of the year.

“Today’s college students face enormous pressure to learn faster, tackle harder problems, and enter a workforce increasingly shaped by AI,” said Leah Belsky, Vice President of Education at OpenAI.

"Supporting their AI literacy means more than demonstrating how these tools work. It requires creating space for students to engage directly, experiment, learn from peers, and ask their own questions.”

This bold initiative by OpenAI comes just one day after Anthropic, a major rival in the AI space, announced its own educational offering, Claude for Education. Claude’s “Learning Mode” uses Socratic questioning to guide students through problems, promoting critical thinking rather than offering direct answers.

The rapid-fire competition between OpenAI and Anthropic mirrors the fierce rivalry seen in the browser wars of the 1990s, where companies like Netscape and Internet Explorer fought for dominance by offering free software.

In today’s AI race, gaining the loyalty of students now could translate into significant market share in the future workplace, with students potentially advocating for these tools in their professional lives, influencing AI adoption on a larger scale.

According to OpenAI, more than one-third of U.S. adults aged 18-24 already use ChatGPT, and around 25% of their queries are related to academic work.

With free access to ChatGPT Plus, students now have access to valuable features that can greatly enhance their academic experiences.

ChatGPT Plus offers higher message limits, priority access during peak usage times, and exclusive tools like Deep Research, which can assist students in analyzing academic papers, synthesizing information, and generating comprehensive reports.

Deep Research represents a major leap for academic research, as it allows students to go beyond traditional search engines. Instead of just retrieving documents, the feature can identify relationships between sources, analyze different methodologies, and highlight varying interpretations of data.

This not only accelerates research but also deepens students' understanding of complex topics.

While OpenAI is focusing on empowering students with advanced AI tools, Anthropic is emphasizing skill-building with its Claude platform.

Claude’s “Learning Mode” encourages a more interactive, critical approach to learning, offering guidance through problem-solving rather than simple answers.

These contrasting approaches reflect a fundamental difference in how each company envisions the role of AI in education—OpenAI sees it as a productivity booster, while Anthropic positions Claude as a developmental partner for learning.

As AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude become more ingrained in academic workflows, universities are facing growing challenges in how to incorporate these technologies into assessments.

The rapid evolution of AI raises concerns about academic integrity, with AI now capable of generating essays, solving problems, and mimicking personal reflections, all of which could complicate traditional forms of assessment.

In response, some institutions are rethinking how they assess students. Some universities have already adjusted their guidelines to allow AI for brainstorming and editing, but not for producing final work without citation.

Others are exploring ways to teach students how to use AI ethically and effectively, turning it into a collaborative tool for learning rather than simply a shortcut for completing assignments.

For now, students can take full advantage of the free ChatGPT Plus service, which provides unrestricted access to GPT-4o, unlimited image generation through DALL-E, and the Advanced Voice Mode, which allows for conversational interaction.

Students can also access Deep Research, which offers insights for academic writing and comprehensive literature reviews. To activate the service, students need to verify their enrollment status through SheerID, an identity verification service.

As OpenAI continues to expand its influence in education, the competition with Anthropic is only just beginning, with both companies vying for the next generation of AI-savvy professionals.