OpenAI is making ChatGPT sound like Santa for the holidays.
The startup announced on Thursday that ChatGPT users could access a new “Santa Mode” voice for the month of December. The feature allows users to speak with ChatGPT’s existing real-time voice feature, Advanced Voice Mode, but with a Christmas twist. The voice sounds, well, “merry and bright,” as OpenAI described it. Think boomy, jolly — more or less like every Santa you’ve ever heard.
OpenAI is releasing the feature just ahead of the 2024 holiday season, a time when many families with young children will be cooped up in the house all day, and will likely use Santa Mode quite a bit. OpenAI also added visual understanding to ChatGPT on Thursday, as part of its 12 Days of OpenAI event, allowing the AI system to understand live video from your camera. That means Santa Mode will also be able to “see” your family, as well as talk to it.
Santa Mode will appear as a snowflake icon in ChatGPT to the right of the prompt bar, and it should be rolling out today to all users on mobile, web, and the ChatGPT MacOS and Windows desktop apps. The company says chats with Santa won’t be saved in chat history or affect memory.