OpenAI bets on families as ChatGPT goes deeper into households

More than three years after the launch of ChatGPT made generative AI mainstream, OpenAI is broadening its focus from individual users to families.

Open AI is hire a dedicated product manager in San Francisco to build experiences for families, caregivers and older adults with its products. The role requires experience building products for parents and families, and other trust-sensitive consumer experiences, the job posting said.

The hiring comes as ChatGPT’s audience continues to expand beyond younger users. According to Sensor Tower estimates shared exclusively with TechCrunch, the share of ChatGPT users aged 35 and older globally increased from 26% a year earlier to 31% in the second quarter, while the share of users aged 18 to 24 fell from 34% to 29%. In the U.S., nearly one in four smartphone users who are parents used ChatGPT during the quarter, up from 16% a year earlier, the company estimates.

OpenAI did not respond to requests for comment on the job posting.

A specific product role aimed at families signals that OpenAI is starting to view its products less as tools for individual productivity and more as technology designed for households, said Ben Bajarin, CEO of technology consultancy Creative Strategies.

“This is similar to the path that Google, Apple and Meta eventually followed as their platforms became embedded in everyday life, but AI raises the stakes because the assistant doesn’t just mediate content or devices,” he told TechCrunch.

This shift also brings new challenges in terms of trust and security. Stephen Balkam, CEO of the Family Online Safety Institute, said the hire reflects both the maturity of OpenAI and a growing recognition that AI products used by children and teens require different safeguards than products designed for adults.

“I see this as safety through redesign,” Balkam told TechCrunch. “You’re taking the first product or service that was released… not really with children in mind… so this is a much-needed reaction and response.”

The comments come as new research published this week by the Family Online Safety Institute found that parents underestimate how often their children use generative AI. While 27% of American parents said their child had used generative AI in the past week, 38% of children said they had done so themselves, according to the survey of more than 4,000 families in the United States and Australia.

Balkam told TechCrunch that AI companies need to build products differently for younger users, with stronger content controls, age-appropriate experiences, parental controls, and reminders to inform users that they are interacting with an AI – and not a human.

The hiring also comes as increasing attention is paid to how AI companies protect younger users. OpenAI has faced multiple lawsuits parents claim that ChatGPT contributed to the damage suffered by their children, including in cases involving suicide.

In response to some of these concerns, OpenAI has introduced a range of security measures over the past year, including parental controls on teen accounts, routing sensitive conversations to reasoning models designed to better deal with signs of distress, and, most recently, an optional “Trusted Contact” feature that can alert a family member or caregiver in case of potential self-harm.

AI companies, Balkam said, have an opportunity to avoid the mistakes made by social media platforms, which for years treated children as adults before adding stronger safeguards amid mounting public pressure and regulatory scrutiny.

The hire also aligns with OpenAI’s broader efforts around families. In a recent workshop hosted with the San Antonio Spurs Community Impact organization and the Positive Coaching Alliance, the company said it aimed to explore the role of AI in youth learning, coaching and engagement.

That said, the demographic shift isn’t unique to ChatGPT, although OpenAI’s audience is changing in a number of different ways.

Sensor Tower estimates that users aged 25 to 34 represent 40% of the global app audience for Anthropic’s Claude and Google’s Gemini, which matches ChatGPT, compared to 33% for Microsoft’s Copilot. However, Copilot is older: 20% of users are 45 years or older, compared to 14% for Claude, 12% for Gemini and 11% for ChatGPT.

While ChatGPT remains relatively underpenetrated among older users, it is adding them faster than its rivals. The share of users aged 45 and older rose three percentage points year-over-year in the second quarter, compared with a two-point increase for Copilot and a decline for Claude and Gemini, Sensor Tower said.

Among US smartphone users who are parents, Gemini had the largest reach at 32% in the second quarter, followed by ChatGPT at 24%, Claude at 4% and Copilot at 2%.

For Bajarin, OpenAI’s decision to hire a product manager focused on families signals where consumer AI is going. As AI becomes a technology shared across generations, he expects companies to roll out family plans, child and teen profiles, tools for caregivers, shared household memory, AI guidance and stricter security controls.