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This unification is garbage. Chats that are about topics other than programming projects are relegated to a tiny, unsearchable popup window. Renaming the old app "ChatGPT Classic" implies that it will be discontinued at some point. This is a serious regression. What existed before worked fine.
I would expect the mode switcher to include a Chat mode, which would recreate the old, chat-focused UI, for asking about random topics. So, that's basically gone now. Technically, it's hidden and severely castrated.
I hope someone from OpenAI reads this. You guys have made a serious design mistake. I suspect you'll be getting a lot of support requests along the lines of "Where did all my chats go?"
This thread is so spot on but I can also imagine the product development internally is moving so fast that they're trying to reconcile everything and can't. And this is the huge mistake so many companies make. Leave what's working alone. Build new adjacent things. It's clear they want to make money and work or code is the focus of enterprise. But never rename something Classic...so bad.
Anthropic just changed their web interface yesterday to have Chat versus Cowork as well, and every time I look at it, I'm so confused. I'm still so unclear when I'm supposed to use one or the other or the other.
Now the 'ChatGPT desktop app' (the Codex app, renamed) also has the split between work and code, and as far as I can tell, all it does is change which plugins are loaded by default to include Office ones when you put it in work mode. Perhaps it also changes the system prompt slightly?
On one hand, this had to happen at some point. I feel the split between ChatGPT vs. Codex wasn't helping OpenAI.
Anthropic did it right from the beginning by unifying everything in the same application. From my perspective, Codex is much better than any other app, but for non-technical users they were still stuck in ChatGPT only, and "nobody" knew about Codex. Anthropic also did it better by putting everything under the "Claude" brand: Claude Code, Claude Cowork, etc. Compared to ChatGPT vs Codex. OpenAI seems to be trying to revert that unwanted split.
With that said, I share the sentiment that it's 100% unclear what's the difference between Codex and Work. Chats now are a second-class citizen of the app. Although the "Attach to task" feature of chats looks useful. Putting "Chats" below the "Tasks" section would have been much better.
This may end up badly. Most people use ChatGPT just for regular chats, and they are not used to "agentic" interactions. It may take people time to adapt, and you can definitely lose users during that transition.
This also seems to have indirect implications regarding pricing. Codex (and Work) consume credits. Chats were also limited before, but you could mostly use ChatGPT without thinking about it. Now people will inevitably use Codex/Work more, simply because that's what the UI shows them, thus consuming credits. This will force you to keep an eye on credits a lot more.
Others have mentioned that the old ChatGPT can't be installed any more. Only if you had it installed before, it now became ChatGPT Classic. However, you can still add the chatgpt.com page as a Web App. You'll need an internet connection to use it, but the old ChatGPT app wasn't working properly without internet anyway... so the overall experience may not be that different. I'd even say that, to me, the web UI has always felt more polished than the native app.
I have a longer version of this, but in summary
So my understanding of the differences between chat, code and co-work; but may well be wrong!
Chat is the human, talking directly to the LLM - old school. Very basic can create docs etc - but saves in a temp folder. No real access to your local PC.
Cowork / work - Human talking to an agent, which can then use tools to do work. Also runs in a container, allowing it access to your drives/computer.
Claude Code / Codex - No longer in a container, full access to the computer, depending on what permissions you give. No longer locked in a container. + The agent is more focused on coding than cowork / work.
It's probably been commented here before but I'll add my voice: they did NOT think this through.
If you're gonna try and make people use one app for everything, at least make it differently optimized between modes. And how are you supposed to chat with ChatGPT while Codex works on a technical task?! (once they retire Classic)
I had switched from Claude Cowork to OAI Codex a month ago. This seems like a rebranding and app merging to make it more obvious. And switching between the newly named "ChatGPT Work" vs "ChatGPT Code" mostly just seems to increase the verbosity of technical outputs, while using the same harness underneath.
I switched because Cowork felt like a bunch of features thrown in by engineers without thought to the UX. Codex solved a lot of those issues for me - remote control from mobile has native approval dialogs, and you can start new threads from mobile - you can remote control from another laptop - computer use doesn't hijack my computer from me because it uses a11y trees instead of screenshots - it was super unclear which skills were accessible to which surface (claude chat, cowork in app, code in app, code in cli). - codex chooses the right browser profile and gets stuck less often than cowork + claude-in-chrome. I know there are 3P skills to use playwright or the chrome CDP, but I've found the native browser use most productive even if slower.
A few people here are missing the old ChatGPT app, but I found myself increasingly using Codex for casual chats too, and never using ChatGPT. You never know when the conversation might evolve to requiring tools in Codex, so no real downside to it. Yes, separation of work and personal accounts, or connecting multiple google accounts, is still unsolved on both Codex and Cowork AFAICT.
For a bit, I got FOMO because of Fable, but now it looks like 5.6 might continue the monthly model leapfrog pattern.
So, Claude Cowork for OpenAI? Feels overdue!
I've loved using Cowork recently for sourcing decisions. Things where seemingly everyone's out of stock or questionably reputable, just let Cowork spin for 20 minutes, find the best new and best used options that meet your requirements, probably also suggesting a different item that does the job and is available for cheap. I've done it enough that I'm starting to loathe clicking through these sites myself.
Been excited for Codex to fully merge into ChatGPT, like it already has on iOS and how Claude Code merged into Claude a while back. Assumed there would simply be an update for ChatGPT that added Codex like on iOS. But instead a new "ChatGPT for Work" app. Which is fine. Downloaded and it replaces the standard ChatGPT app, again fine an as expected, but when I open it I just see Codex essentially. In top left, when changing from Code to ChatGPT still not seeing all of my ChatGPT aka years of Chat History. Other than one a box that says recent chats that only lets you see the latest 3 or 4 chats and opens them up in a small window. Am I missing something?
I think these kind of semi-coding agents--but hosted--are the future for enterprises. Claude Tag, Claude Cowork, now Work by OAI.
Agents-on-your-machine clearly have their place, but for many workflows this is too unruly. Hence, the "long-running agent running on shared infra" pattern.
I think this is where the ball is headed. I'm building towards an open source version of this[0]. Still just working on the core, but hopefully soon self-hosted versions can be built on top.
What they did to ChatGPT.app is incredible. It was a truly useful app, but the replacement is brain damaged in terms of UI/UX beyond repair.
Incredible, really.
I agree that the new UX is confusing and ill-designed.
A UI is supposed to help the user develop a mental model for what's happening under the covers. But what's happening when you switch from ChatGPT Work to ChatGPT Codex? If I switch it while in an existing session, nothing seems to happen. Does that mean it did nothing? If so, why let the user switch it at all.
When I switch it in the new conversation state, the help text changes from "What should we build?" to "What should we get done?". As near as I can tell, the switch gives me access to different sets of tools. But does that mean that some tools are not available in both modes? Why? Why not let the agent access all tools and pick the one based on context? Why are you forcing me to choose up front? And what happens if I choose poorly?
I get that OpenAI is moving fast, but I feels like a single round of usability testing might have helped.
I wonder why they haven’t simply continued to rebrand Codex as a general-purpose tool. ChatGPT Work is a convoluted name and continues the trend of having separate brands for separate things, what runs counter to OpenAI’s purported goal of unifying every workflow into a single “superapp”.
Worse still: what happens when your workflow involves both coding and general knowledge work? Are you expected to switch apps, or switch settings? To me, it sounds very confusing and inefficient, and not at all what I was expecting.
> The updated ChatGPT desktop app (opens in a new window) is available globally today for Mac and Windows, with Chat, Work, and Codex available to users on every plan, including Free. > If you already use the Codex app, you can update it as usual and it will become the new ChatGPT desktop app. Developers can make Codex the default view when they open the desktop app and choose the Codex logo as the app icon. Desktop Codex projects remain accessible on the go through the ChatGPT mobile app. The existing version of the ChatGPT desktop app will be renamed ChatGPT Classic.
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Edit: I just got the update – the new ChatGPT.app is 1.46 GB
The resulting "combined" Codex + ChatGPT mac app is super confusing. I use the Codex app with my work account, but I liked the old ChatGPT app, which I kept logged in with my personal account, for my LLM chat needs. I guess I can just use ChatGPT.com, but this was a rather jarring change.
Desktop app situation is truly a mess for the trillion dollar AI companies, OpenAI and Anthropic.
After updating codex, it disappeared and chatdpt was still the old version. So I downloaded the latest chat gct from the website and it just said: "Couldn't install ChatGPT"
So I had to open Claude which was just a completely blank screen to try and debug the installation of ChatGPT.
I just clicked "Upgrade" in the macOS Codex Desktop app and it relaunched with a new name, "ChatGPT". My existing install of the macOS ChatGPT app seems to have been renamed "ChatGPT Classic".
It's uncanny how much the job of "crafting contrived yet plausible scenarios to over-sell the utility of our service" has become such a critical part of AI vendor marketing.
Not very thrilled mainly because I used chats for ad-hoc search queries. Now it's hard to reach. Not to mention private chats being removed.
Regarding "ChatGPT Work" vs "ChatGPT Codex" - In Work diffs are gone and in new chats there's a popup proposing creating docs or sheets. That's it I believe.
Very similar to what I've been building with https://blackbear.app, though I have yet to hit integrations as fully. Took a different approach and built editors for markdown, documents, slides, etc. natively. Definitely excited to try this out and see what works and what doesn't
I think their goal is to merge Codex and ChatGPT usage.
Why did they break a perfectly working system.
Instead of keeping Codex work isolated, now I have to deal with other constant changing bloat.
The toggle feels useless in the desktop app. It just changes a few shortcuts?!
Admittedly, I was already using Codex a bit like Claude Cowork. I'm just surprised they decided to merge threads.
It took me a while until I found that you can switch between those two parts Work and Codex within the app on the left top corner when clicking on "ChatGPT Codex". And then - nothing happens. The old ChatGPT projects of my chats are gone, only appearing on the web. Wow, what a bad UX pattern.
> With Codex technology built-in, ChatGPT can now move beyond answering questions to getting real work done across web, mobile, and desktop.
This looks like OpenAI catching up to Anthropic's Cowork.
Does using chat in the new codex app use up your allowance? Any indication openai are moving to a model where al usage is metered?
ChatGPT Codex launches, and it's the worst of both worlds. Who would have thought?
Very interesting approach, however I wonder if the combination of Codex + Work in the same app makes sense? I could see a world where the technical needs of a developer are hampered by the overall superapp architecture. I guess we'll see?
Did OpenAI obliterate the ability to use Codex from mobile the way you can use Claude Code on iOS?
I wish OpenAI had a family plan. I would love to pay and have my wife and kids use ChatGPT on a single subscription.
Man do I hate applications that create folders in my Documents folder.
Codex just started downloading an update and it's gone. It removed itself.
I guess it's supposed to be a part of ChatGPT now, but I cannot see any update there yet.
btw I kinda hate this, because ChatGPT was always very slow for me - possibly due to amount of historical threads I have there
So I've now lost all my ChatGPT chats? Or did they hide them? I see some of them, but the history is inaccessible??
Edit: I found them back in the 'classic' version of the app. Wildly confusing what is going to happen to the data there, chats, projects, custom GPT's.
This is going to be fun tomorrow when everyone at the company I work at finds out all their chats, projects and GPT’s are ‘gone’ after they ‘update’. And not a word about this switcheroo ‘data loss’ in their comms. Wow.
All models I’ve used have been exceptionally bad at creating a high level business oriented vision and strategy from various inputs. The output just feels like it can’t see past the next word, or render distance, misses the big picture and anything not specified in prompt or input context
I sure hope it does!
So confused.
ChatGPT Work: because what every enterprise needed was an AI that can write your quarterly report and also gaslight you into thinking the deadline was always next week.
Microsoft is continuing the tradition of very confusing names
Honestly, there's just no way I'm giving these tools broad access to my computer. Claude recently started bugging me that I hadn't configured it to be able to access my email, which like, fuck off anthropic. It just seems like a security nightmare and a dangerous level of trust to have in these companies. To me, it's like: here's a folder you can work in, and if you try to do anything outside of it you can fuck off because I'm uninstalling you. I just don't think it's worth dealing with things like potential identity theft or it doing something brain damaged to my data so it can search my inbox or summarize someone's overly-long LLM written email. I know some people run these things in VMs which is smart, but as soon as you give it any sort of network access or access to sensitive data it's just way too big of a risk vector.
It'd be super nice if tech companies stopped just building the same product and gave us concretely different ideas.
That graph of internal adoption rate is laughable. Their KPIs and work requirements probably heavily skewed the curve.
[flagged]
who cares?
Am I the only one who thinks this landing page is garbage? Funkily it feels like a long wall of slop. I guess you shouldn’t get high on your own supply.
Yeah... No.
I can get some useful results from codex at work, because I have to, except for when I don't. I accept that risk factor and compensate by reviewing _everything_ it spits out.
But we all know what coding is, in a very broad stroke manner, sure.
What does an end of month report mean? I automatically increase the font size when I send the spreadsheet to Paul. I review tickets and provide a meta write-up on Friday. Or maybe Monday, because Fred didn't get back to me until 5:30 Friday, and I closed my laptop at 4.
These are just little things, and they're repetitive, but each time, there's some little idiosyncracy. I have reservations regarding any piece of software being able to finesse that.
I just installed this. I am very confused. I no longer have a Codex app on my computer. ChatGPT is now Codex.
But what happened to ChatGPT? Where am I supposed to casually chat?
Also, when you toggle btween ChatGPT Work and ChatGPT Codex, nothing changes. This is super confusing. Can someone from the OpenAI team clarify the difference btwn the modes? Does chatgpt work have more business-y related plugins turned on by default?
Edit: So it seems like the only place you can actually chat with chatgpt is in an awkward homeless nested window. idk. The chatgpt interface wasn't great (desperately needed artifacts), but I still used it a lot. I can't see this change going well with a lot of the casual users.
Edit2: In their awkward homeless nested chat mode, you cannot even edit past messages. this is a mess, why was the team so zealous to pull the switch on unification in this state? guessing there was internal pressure to juice codex's growth but, based on what im seeing, they did it by torching chatgpt?
Edit 3: Ok so it seems like ChatGPT is still around, but renamed to "ChatGPT Classic". Seems like it wont be long for this world because there's no place to download ChatGPT Classic should you choose to uninstall it. The dmg at https://chatgpt.com/download/ only contains the new ChatGPT.