By Kimeko McCoy • April 21, 2026 •
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OpenAI’s ad playbook may leave some marketers with whiplash given its pacing. In the last month, the platform has struck deals with ad tech partners like Criteo and Smartly, hired former Meta exec Dave Dugan to oversee its ad business, launched a self-serve manager in testing, rolled out pixels to track ad conversion — and now, its ads are getting cheaper.
That’s a lot for a company that only launched an ads business two months ago. The breakneck clip at which OpenAI is moving begs the question: Is OpenAI moving too fast with their ads?
“It seems like at this point, they’re running at lightning speed,” Krystal Scanlon, senior platforms reporter at Digiday said. Scanlon joined the latest episode of the Digiday Podcast to discuss OpenAI’s ad business roadmap. She added, “In one sense, it’s almost like they have to catch up, and catch up fast.”
