OpenAI has rapidly established a dominant position in U.S. higher education, securing more than 700,000 ChatGPT licenses across 35 public universities, according to purchase orders reviewed by Bloomberg. The agreements place ChatGPT well ahead of rival academic AI tools from Microsoft and Google, whose offerings have seen slower and more limited adoption on campuses.
Usage data highlights how deeply ChatGPT has become embedded in academic workflows. At 20 U.S. universities surveyed, students and faculty logged more than 14 million ChatGPT interactions in September 2025 alone.
On average, each user engaged with the tool 176 times during the month, primarily for writing assistance, research support, and data analysis. OpenAI reports that it has already sold over one million college licenses globally.
Pricing has played a decisive role in shaping this adoption gap. Universities are paying only a few dollars per user each month for bulk access to ChatGPT, a steep discount compared to the standard $20 individual educational subscription. By contrast, Microsoft initially quoted institutions $30 per user per month for Copilot, later reducing academic pricing to $18 earlier this year.
One of the largest agreements comes from the California State University system, which has agreed to pay OpenAI $15 million annually to provide access to ChatGPT for roughly 500,000 students and staff. According to system Chief Information Officer Ed Clark, ChatGPT emerged as the most cost-effective and familiar option after administrators evaluated several competing AI tools.
While Microsoft’s Copilot has seen stronger uptake among faculty at some institutions, student usage has lagged behind. Google has attempted to accelerate adoption by offering Gemini Pro free to college students for a year and promoting it across university systems. Despite these efforts, ChatGPT still commands an estimated 74% share of AI usage in education, according to Copyleaks’ 2025 AI in Education Trends report.
Other large universities are following a similar path. Arizona State University, one of the largest U.S. schools by enrollment, rolled out ChatGPT licenses to all students and staff in September. By late November, nearly 10,000 students and 6,400 employees had already used the service. Anne Jones, vice provost for undergraduate education at Arizona State, said the shift reflects a broader reality in higher education. “We don’t think there’s going to be an option in the future to opt out,” she said.
The change marks a sharp reversal from the early days of generative AI, when many universities banned or restricted ChatGPT over concerns about plagiarism and academic integrity. Institutions are now increasingly treating AI tools as core infrastructure rather than optional technology.
OpenAI has reinforced this push by expanding its education-focused sales team and hiring Leah Belsky, formerly of Coursera, to lead its education initiatives. Belsky, now OpenAI’s vice president of education, said college students are among the company’s most active users.
Government policy is also aligning with this transition. The U.S. administration recently announced new grant priorities that include a $50 million fund aimed at expanding AI access across higher education. Separately, Reed Hastings donated $50 million to Bowdoin College to support research into AI’s impact on teaching and learning.
Even campuses without formal OpenAI contracts are seeing heavy ChatGPT usage. At Texas State University, internal documents reviewed by Bloomberg show ChatGPT usage running at roughly twice the level of Copilot, with Google’s Gemini also slightly ahead of Microsoft’s tool despite the university’s deep ties to Microsoft software. At the University of Nebraska at Omaha, 92% of surveyed teachers, librarians, and students said they would recommend ChatGPT, citing time savings of one to five hours per week, particularly for writing and brainstorming tasks.
The rapid campus expansion also aligns with OpenAI’s broader business ambitions. The company is reportedly in discussions to raise as much as $100 billion at a valuation of around $750 billion and is preparing for a potential initial public offering in 2026, which could value it at nearly $1 trillion.
For OpenAI, education represents a long-term strategy rather than short-term revenue alone. By becoming the default AI assistant for today’s students, ChatGPT could shape how future professionals write, analyse data, and solve problems across industries for decades to come.
