OpenAI shut down Sora, its AI video-generation app, just six months after launch because it was too costly and underused. The app allowed users to upload their faces for video generation, but global users dropped from around 1 million to fewer than 500,000. Running the app consumed roughly $1 million daily in AI compute resources.
With Sora draining resources, OpenAI refocused on more profitable AI projects, as competitors like Anthropic and its Claude Code were gaining ground. Even Disney, which had committed $1 billion to a partnership involving Sora, was informed of the shutdown less than an hour before the public announcement.
