AI NewsOpenAI is shutting down Atlas, but its AI browser ambitions are still growing
OpenAI is shutting down Atlas, but its AI browser ambitions are still growing
4:32 AM IST · July 10, 2026

OpenAI issunsettingAtlas, the AI-powered browser itlaunched in Octoberwith ChatGPT at its core. But itâs not giving up on the idea that AI should help people browse the web. Instead, itâs taking some of the agentic browsing features it tested in Atlas and redistributing them across ChatGPTâs desktop app and a Google Chrome extension. The move to shut down Atlas comes a few months after OpenAIâs CEO of applications Fidji Simo told the team tocut back on âside quests,âwhich led to the AI firm shutting down its AIvideo-generation tool Sora. For much of the past year, the AI industry had been engaged in awar to unseat Chromeas the place where people spend most of their time online. Perplexity launched Comet, The Browser Company launched Dia, and Google and Microsoft have updated Chrome and Edge, respectively, with new AI-powered features. After a few months of experimenting, OpenAI appears to have concluded that the browser is a feature, not the destination. So itâs folding Atlasâ browser-like agent capabilities into the places people already work â and that includes Chrome. OpenAI is launching a ChatGPT extension on Chrome that gives it access to the context of the page youâre viewing, lets users ask questions about web pages, summarize content, or start longer tasks all from the browser. Itâs a direct competitor to Googleâs Gemini Side Panel, which performs several of the same tasks. OpenAI is also boosting its ChatGPT desktop app by featuring a more robust browser that allows users to browse websites, log into accounts, download files, and interact with web pages without leaving ChatGPT. A separate cloud browser runs remotely on OpenAIâs servers as a place where the appâs agents can complete tasks on a userâs behalf. Together, the updates turn ChatGPT into a continuous workspace that spans Chrome, the desktop app, and an AI agent.
read more



