according to the latest disclosure by bloomberg reporter mark gurman, openai is preparing legal action against apple, driven by escalating disagreements and growing gaps in their deep integration partnership for chatgpt. this development comes as a surprise—after all, as recently as 2024, the two companies publicly announced a strategic collaboration to integrate chatgpt into ios, ipados, and macos, covering scenarios such as siri voice assistance and intelligent photo‑gallery analysis. iphone users could even subscribe directly through system settings, while apple collected a percentage of revenue under the agreement.
however, reality has fallen far short of the official hype. openai’s internal expectations vastly exceeded the actual results: it had hoped chatgpt would become one of the foundational pillars of siri’s intelligent interactions, rather than merely an optional add‑on. at the same time, openai felt apple was severely lacking in marketing efforts, leaving most users unaware of the features already available. while annual revenues were initially projected to reach hundreds of millions of dollars, actual adoption has been negligible. adding to the frustration, apple’s traditionally closed development process has made it difficult for openai to grasp integration details—from api call logic to interface presentation—leaving nearly everything shrouded in opacity.
a senior executive familiar with the matter privately described the partnership as “almost a complete failure,” bluntly stating that apple’s attitude bordered on negligence: “they asked us to place our trust in them, yet provided no transparent roadmap.” he also noted that product‑level efforts had reached their limit, while apple neither fulfilled its collaborative commitments nor demonstrated basic goodwill in execution. currently, users must actively invoke “chatgpt” to trigger related responses, and siri’s built‑in chat functionality has been significantly scaled back, falling far short of the experience offered by the official app.
although no formal lawsuit has been filed yet, openai has activated multiple contingency plans, including sending a notice of breach to apple. legal action remains a fallback option rather than the first choice, as the company still prefers seeking a negotiated resolution before reaching the litigation threshold.
it’s worth noting that apple plans to introduce third‑party ai models like gemini and claude in ios 27, but this is not the primary source of openai’s discontent—the original partnership was never intended to be exclusive. what truly stings openai is the severe imbalance between investment and returns, coupled with the reality of being marginalized in a key ecosystem niche. today, the once‑glowing aura of their collaboration is fading, and a quiet battle over influence and commercial fairness has quietly begun between these two silicon valley giants.
