OpenAI has walked back a controversial decision from last week that removed user access to older ChatGPT models when GPT-5 became the new default. Following a surge of complaints across forums and social media, legacy models like GPT-4o, GPT-4.1, o3, and o4-mini are once again available—but only for paid users who know where to look.

OpenAI has reinstated GPT-4o as a default model option for paid ChatGPT subscribers, reversing a controversial change made during last week’s release of GPT-5. CEO Sam Altman announced the GPT-4o move on Wednesday, along with other updates to the company’s AI chatbot.