All residents of the UAE will receive access to ChatGPT Plus, a premium version of OpenAI’s chatbot, after a major partnership was agreed between the company and the UAE government, OpenAI said in a statement in May.
The agreement provides nationwide access, not free personal subscriptions, OpenAI clarified.
ChatGPT’s free version is currently inaccessible in the UAE, while ChatGPT Plus costs $20 a month.
“Under the partnership, the UAE will become the first country in the world to enable ChatGPT nationwide—giving people across the country the ability to access OpenAI’s technology,” OpenAI said.
“The new partnership will support the UAE in leveraging OpenAI’s tools across critical sectors like government, energy, healthcare, education, and transportation to help accelerate innovation and economic growth while creating lasting benefits for its people,” the statement added.
The announcement comes after the UAE committed to investing $1.4 trillion in the US in support of job creation, economic growth, and helping the US maintain its technological leadership.
Run through Abu Dhabi-based Stargate UAE
The project will be operated through Stargate UAE, the first international deployment of Stargate, OpenAI’s infrastructure platform.
“Stargate represents our long-term vision for building frontier-scale compute capacity around the world in service of safe, secure, and broadly beneficial [artificial general intelligence],” OpenAI said.
Stargate UAE will entail building a 1-gigawatt artificial intelligence computing cluster in Abu Dhabi, in partnership with companies including G42, Oracle, NVIDIA, and Cisco.
In the first phase of the project, around 200 megawatts are expected to be generated in 2026.
Stargate supports safe, global tech development in tandem with US interests
OpenAI hopes that the partnership will encourage other countries to sign similar partnerships, under its OpenAI for Countries initiative, with OpenAI CSO Jason Kwon currently hosting an OpenAI for Countries roadshow across Asia Pacific.
“We aim to pursue 10 partnerships across key countries and regions—laying the foundation for a globally distributed, democratically powered AI network,” the statement said.
The initiative will “help interested governments build sovereign AI capability in coordination with the US government,” the statement said, adding that OpenAI reinforces its “commitment to strengthening US infrastructure while helping allies gain access to transformative AI responsibly and securely.”