OpenAI says 18 to 24-year-olds account for nearly 50% of ChatGPT usage in India

OpenAI released statistics on Friday revealing that users between 18 and 24 years of age account for nearly 50% of all messages sent by Indians to ChatGPT, demonstrating strong product-market fit with young Indian audiences. The AI company's data shows that users under 30 constitute 80% of ChatGPT usage in India, indicating a significant youth adoption of the technology that differs from global usage patterns. Unlike international trends where ChatGPT usage is more evenly distributed across age groups, India's user base skews dramatically younger, suggesting a generational shift in how AI tools are being embraced. The statistics reveal that Indians are primarily using ChatGPT for professional purposes, with 35% of all messages relating to work tasks—higher than the global average of 30%. This professional orientation is particularly evident in the usage of OpenAI's coding assistant Codex, which Indians use three times more than the global median. Weekly usage of Codex has increased fourfold since the tool received a Mac app two weeks ago, and Indian users ask three times as many coding-related questions as the median user globally. These findings align with data from competitor Anthropic, which reported that 45.2% of Claude's tasks in India relate to software development. Beyond professional use, Indians employ ChatGPT for guidance (35%), general information queries (20%), and writing assistance (20%). India represents OpenAI's second-largest market with over 100 million weekly users, prompting the company to actively court Indian customers through a sub-$5 subscription tier and promotional campaigns. OpenAI's chief economist Ronnie Chatterji emphasized the importance of grounding India's AI debate in real-world evidence rather than hype. The company has been expanding its presence in India by opening new offices in Mumbai and Bengaluru, partnering with Tata Group for AI compute capacity and enterprise distribution, and collaborating with various tech companies and educational institutions to reach more than 100,000 students over the next six years.