OpenAI to retire Sora April 26

OpenAI will shut down Sora’s web and app products on April 26, 2026, ending the standalone service about 16 months after its public launch. (help.openai.com) (openai.com) Sora’s application programming interface, the version developers plug into other software, is scheduled to stay up until September 24, 2026. OpenAI told users to export videos and images before the app cutoff and said data will be permanently deleted after any final export window ends. (help.openai.com) Sora was OpenAI’s text-to-video system, a tool that turns written prompts into short clips by starting with visual noise and refining it step by step into moving scenes. OpenAI said the model could generate videos up to one minute long in its research phase, then shipped a consumer product in December 2024 with clips up to 20 seconds at as much as 1080p. (openai.com 1) (openai.com 2) OpenAI expanded the product after launch instead of freezing it in place. The company released Sora 2 on September 30, 2025 with synchronized dialogue and sound effects, and added an editor for web and iPhone on March 19, 2026. (openai.com) (help.openai.com) The shutdown lands as video generation remains one of the most compute-heavy corners of generative artificial intelligence. OpenAI said at launch that Sora still struggled with affordability, and The Decoder reported this week that graphics processing unit rental prices had jumped nearly 50 percent as demand for artificial intelligence systems outpaced supply. (openai.com) (the-decoder.com) OpenAI has not given a public reason in its help article for ending Sora, but outside reports have tied the move to rising compute costs and a broader capacity crunch across the industry. The Decoder, citing The Wall Street Journal, said labs are redirecting scarce chips toward products with heavier business demand, including coding tools and autonomous agents. (help.openai.com) (the-decoder.com) The timing is abrupt because OpenAI was still shipping new Sora features weeks before the cutoff notice. On February 4, 2026, it expanded image-to-video with photos of family and friends under stricter guardrails, and on February 9 it added “Extensions” to continue scenes while keeping characters and settings consistent. (help.openai.com) For existing users, the practical deadline is April 26 for the app and September 24 for the application programming interface. The bigger signal is that even a flagship artificial intelligence video product from OpenAI did not survive a year and a half as a standalone service. (help.openai.com) (openai.com)