ChatGPT is rapidly getting better at answering user questions, but it will likely soon be able to navigate the internet for users.
OpenAI’s Chief Product Officer Kevin Weil has hinted at exciting developments for ChatGPT in 2025. In an interview, Weil suggested a significant shift in the chatbot’s functionality, moving beyond answering questions to actively performing tasks on the web. His remarks paint a picture of a future where mundane online tasks can be delegated to AI, freeing up valuable time for users.
“We’re very excited about GPT-5,” Weil said. “There are teams working on it as we speak, and I think it’s going to be a fantastic new model when we get there. But, in general, this is the year that ChatGPT goes from answering questions for you to doing things for you in the real world.”
He elaborated on this vision by referencing OpenAI’s “Operator” product, which can already browse the web and execute tasks. “We launched a product earlier this year called Operator that can browse the web like a human and do things for you,” Weil explained. “When I think about the time I spend on the web, I bet 30 or 40% of the time that I’m browsing the web it’s not because I want to be doing what I’m doing, it’s because I have to get something done. And there’s some series of pages and forms I have to fill out and other things. I would love an AI to do that for me.”
Weil’s enthusiasm for this potential was palpable. “I would absolutely love for an AI to fill out those forms for me so that I can concentrate on either getting more work done or spending more time with my family. And this is the year when AI begins to do more things like that for you, and I’m very excited about that.” He attributed this progress to advances in reasoning models: “It comes because of the advances that we’re making with these reasoning models that are getting smarter and safer. And it comes with integrations into the sites that you know and use every day so that our models can understand them and can take action on your behalf.”
And OpenAI could be best positioned to launch such an internet browsing agent. It already has a massive userbase of 500 million, and could attack the problem at both ends — with its massive userbase, it can nudge popular websites into allowing them to be used by AI agents, and once these websites have the requisite integrations, can use ChatGPT’s giant userbase to make them mainstream. OpenAI might be uniquely positioned to do this — Google might have comparable models, but doesn’t yet have an AI product that users frequently go to, and other AI labs don’t yet have the scale for attempting something of this nature. And if ChatGPT does come with agentic integrations later this year, it could very rapidly change the nature of internet browsing forever.