ChatGPT

There are two things to decide: whether you need one assistant for everything and whether you are ready to prepare for access from Russia.

Who it is for. For people who want one tool for email, study, images, document analysis, and voice: ChatGPT keeps text, voice, images, file analysis, and an agent in one window, while text chats are unlimited and free. For those already paying for Plus and wanting AI to do rather than advise: Work mode creates a spreadsheet, presentation, or website from your emails and files.

Who else. For those who need GPT-6 Astra for complex tasks involving files and software. Access is rolling out gradually; terms and a comparison with Sol are collected in the model card.

Who it is not for. For those not ready for preparation steps from Russia: chatgpt.com and the sign-in screen return denials from Russian IP addresses, the app is unavailable in Russian stores, and Russian cards do not work. Also for those who need powerful free AI without workarounds: there is one next door, at DeepSeek.

A fit: section 3 takes you from changing your address to your first question. Choosing between it and DeepSeek: see the fork in section 7.

What vibecoding isStarting from scratch: how to give AI tasks with no coding experience

Since July 2026, ChatGPT has three levels in one window: Chat for questions, Work for finished files, and Codex for code.

Chat. Questions, texts, web search, analysis of uploaded files and photos. On Plus, there is an effort slider below the response with Instant, Medium, and High levels: the higher it is, the longer the model thinks. Extra High and Pro are available from the Pro plan. On Free and Go, there is a Think button instead of the slider, using the lighter GPT-5.6 Luna.

Work. Give it a complete task, and the agent plans the steps, connects to Gmail, Slack, Google Sheets, and Notion, shows progress in the right-hand column, and delivers a document, spreadsheet, presentation, report, or website. It asks you to confirm important actions. Tasks can be scheduled or triggered by an event: an email arrives, a channel message appears, or a pull request changes.

Sites and Codex. Work publishes websites by link on the chatgpt.site domain, and Codex writes and edits code in the same app. Sites are available from the Plus plan, while Codex has limited free access.

Voice, images, memory. Voice mode on GPT-Live-1 listens and speaks at the same time, searches the web, and shows cards right in the conversation; a lighter version works on Free. ChatGPT Images 2.5 creates images on every plan; the exact Flare and Sunburst variants can be selected through the API. In GPT Image 2.5 card we compare them with generation and editing examples. Since 04.06.2026, memory updates itself, while the Sources button below a response shows which memories influenced it.

What was actually done. In the official video, the agent created a supplier spreadsheet from a lamp sketch in two and a half minutes, then generated three product photos and published a store page. We did not run ChatGPT on a task for this card ourselves: the section's facts come from OpenAI's help center, changelog, and launch video.

You do not have to install anything, but from Russia the path starts with changing your IP address.

You can use it from Russia. There are three steps, and the first is standard for foreign services.

Step 1. Change your Russian IP address to a foreign one: a US, Dutch, or any other address from OpenAI's country list. The service is officially unavailable in Russia, so the website will not open without this: from nodes in Moscow and Saint Petersburg chatgpt.com and the sign-in screen returned denials on 05.09.2026, although openai.com and the help center opened.

Step 2. You can ask your first question without registering. For history, files, and voice, you need an account: sign up with an email outside a Russian domain or through Google, Apple, or Microsoft. No phone number is requested at sign-up (checked 05.09.2026); a Google account with a Russian region may produce an error.

Step 3. Ask your first question in Russian: Russian is among the 59 interface languages, and it will answer in the language of the question. Work and Sites become available after paying for Plus; payment is covered in section 5.

Apps. There is no official ChatGPT in the Russian App Store and RuStore storefronts; searches for "chatgpt" return third-party clones, including ones with letters rearranged in the name. Official iPhone and Android versions are in stores of other countries, and the developer must be listed as OpenAI. On a computer, the web version is more reliable; the desktop app for macOS and Windows is installed from the download page, and its sign-in uses the same screen blocked in Russia.

Steps checked 05.09.2026 against the live sign-up screen, the OpenAI Help Center, and an HTTP test from Russian nodes; a T-J guide from 19.01.2026 describes the same steps

Three signals: record audience, shrinking market share, and demand in Russia higher than for any other AI.

Audience. More than one billion people a week according to OpenAI's official post of 31.08.2026; in February, the company cited 900 million, with more than 50 million paying subscribers. Ads on free plans reached a pace equivalent to a billion dollars a year in under 200 days. The world's most-used AI product, unavailable directly from Russia.

Market share. By web visits among seven assistants, ChatGPT holds 53.9% (Similarweb data for May 2026 in Momentic's roundup), versus Gemini at 27.9% and Claude at 9.2%. A year ago ChatGPT had about 76%: the leader remains first but shares the market. There are no public measurements newer than May 2026, and methodologies differ between firms, so keep the date with the figure.

Demand in Russia. "Chat gpt" is searched 1.2 million times a month, "chatgpt" 694 thousand times, and "chat jipiti" 574 thousand times (Wordstat, 05.09.2026). ChatGPT's position among the assistants in our catalog is shown below the card title, while the full tool ranking is on the main page.

You do not have to pay: text is free; you pay for a stronger model, Work, and limits.

Free entry. Free provides unlimited text chats on GPT-5.6 Luna, search, images, and file uploads with limits, plus 500 MB for files. In the US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, Free and Go show ads below the response.

Paid tiers. Go for $8 raises limits, Plus for $20 unlocks GPT-5.6 Sol, full Work, Sites, and schedules, while Pro for $100 or $200 provides 5 and 20 times the Plus limits, the Sol Pro model, and GPT-6 Astra in chat with a limit of 50 or 200 messages per week. Personal plans have no annual billing. For teams of two or more, Business offers seats at $20 and $100 per month with annual billing.

Paying from Russia. Russian cards do not work, and OpenAI warns that paying from a country outside the list will result in a block. The usual options are a foreign card, an App Store gift card, or an intermediary for rubles with a fee. According to our review from 07.07.2026, Plus costs from 1 620 ₽ with your own card to 3 200 ₽ through intermediaries; details in instructions for paying for ChatGPT from Russia.

For developers. The API costs $4 per million input tokens and $20 output tokens for GPT-5.6 Sol (promotional price through at least 21.11.2026), and $10 and $50 for GPT-6 Astra.

Four questions: does it train on your chats, where is the data stored, what about lawsuits, and how often does it go down?

Trains by default. On personal plans, OpenAI may use your chats to train models until you turn off "Improve the model for everyone" in settings; you can turn it off at any time, but this does not erase data already collected. Temporary Chat is not used for training and is deleted after 30 days. Business and Enterprise do not train on data by default.

Data in the US. Only Enterprise offers a choice of data-storage region; personal plans run on OpenAI infrastructure. The working rule is simple: do not upload contracts, customers' personal data, or trade secrets to the chat, just as with any foreign service.

Lawsuits and leaks. In the New York Times v. OpenAI case, on 05.01.2026 the judge confirmed the transfer to plaintiffs of an anonymized sample of 20 million conversations. In February 2026, Check Point found a flaw through which one malicious request could extract messages and files from the code-execution environment; OpenAI fixed it by 20.02.2026, and found no evidence of exploitation.

Noticeable outages. The official status feed lists 15 incidents in the 24 days before 05.09.2026, including a complete chatgpt.com outage on 20.08.2026 and a disruption on 03.09.2026 that drew about 37 thousand reports at its peak on Downdetector. Keep a backup tool for deadline-sensitive work.

Ads see context. On Free and Go, ads are selected by the conversation topic and, if personalization is enabled, by previous chats and memory; advertisers do not see the chats themselves. Separate September news: GPT-6 Astra safety checks may pause a task and ask for confirmation, as the vendor itself warns.

The choice is not "who is smarter," but "how much access hassle and payment are you willing to deal with."

Different barrier. DeepSeek opens directly from Russia, its chat is entirely free, and registration is by email. ChatGPT requires a foreign address and foreign card, but offers voice, images, memory, and Work, which DeepSeek chat does not have.

Different API price. DeepSeek V4 Pro costs $0.66 per million input tokens and $1.98 output tokens during off-peak hours, versus GPT-6 Astra at $10 and $50: a difference of 15 and 25 times. For that difference, ChatGPT provides the market's newest model and an ecosystem of plugins and apps.

Who else is nearby. Gemini stands out with a million-token context window and API pricing ($2 and $12 per million for Gemini 3.1 Pro for requests up to 200 thousand tokens), while Kimi opens from Russia and delivers ready-made files for free.

In four years, the chatbot has become a workspace with an agent inside, and its audience has grown to a billion people per week.