Direct buyer
OpenAI
OpenAI licenses training data mainly through direct deals with large publishers and platforms, and runs a data partnerships program for organizations holding large datasets that are not easily accessible online. Its data partnerships page, published November 9, 2023, gives no payment terms and says OpenAI does not want datasets with sensitive or personal information or information that belongs to a third party.
Facts checked against OpenAI's own pages in November 2026. Visit OpenAI
At a glance
- What it buys
- Large-scale datasets in any modality that are not easily accessible online, especially long-form writing or conversations. Publisher content and archives by direct deal
- Published payout
- Not published. Reported deals run up to about $250 million over five years (News Corp, reported by The Wall Street Journal)
- Who it buys from
- Mainly large publishers and platforms, by direct deal. Other organizations can submit interest through its data partnerships form
- Exclusivity
- Not published
- Fee to seller
- Not published
- Payment timing
- Not published
Key takeaways
- OpenAI is a direct buyer.
- What it buys: Large-scale datasets in any modality that are not easily accessible online, especially long-form writing or conversations. Publisher content and archives by direct deal.
- Published payout: Not published. Reported deals run up to about $250 million over five years (News Corp, reported by The Wall Street Journal).
- Who it buys from: Mainly large publishers and platforms, by direct deal. Other organizations can submit interest through its data partnerships form.
- OpenAI does not publish its exclusivity, fee to seller and payment timing.
- Facts checked on OpenAI's own pages in November 2026.
How does OpenAI acquire training data?
OpenAI acquires licensed training data through two public routes: its data partnerships program, announced on November 9, 2023, and direct licensing deals with publishers and platforms. The data partnerships page asks for large-scale datasets that reflect human society and are not easily accessible online, in any modality, and says OpenAI can process files with optical character recognition and speech recognition.
The page offers two options: contributing to an open-source archive for training language models, or sharing data for private datasets used to train OpenAI's proprietary models. It names the Icelandic Government with Miðeind ehf and the non-profit Free Law Project as early partners. It says nothing about payment.
Which data deals has OpenAI signed?
OpenAI is the licensee in 10 of the deals in our AI data deals tracker, more than any other company listed. Three have a reported value, and the rest were announced without financial terms.
| Date | Licensor | Data | Value as reported |
|---|---|---|---|
| February 2025 | Guardian Media Group | Reporting and archive journalism shown in ChatGPT | Undisclosed |
| November 2024 | Dotdash Meredith | Brand content for training and display in ChatGPT | At least $16 million a year (reported by Adweek) |
| August 2024 | Condé Nast | Vogue, The New Yorker, Wired and other titles for display | Undisclosed |
| May 2024 | News Corp | Current and archived content for display and model training | About $250 million over five years in cash and credits (reported by The Wall Street Journal) |
| May 2024 | Access to Reddit's data API | Undisclosed | |
| May 2024 | Stack Overflow | OverflowAPI access to community content | Undisclosed |
| April 2024 | Financial Times | FT journalism for answers, plus the FT archive for training | Undisclosed |
| December 2023 | Axel Springer | Politico, Business Insider, Bild and Die Welt articles | Tens of millions of euros (reported by Bloomberg) |
| July 2023 | The Associated Press | Part of AP's text archive | Undisclosed |
| July 2023 | Shutterstock | Images, videos, music and metadata | Undisclosed |
Can your company sell data to OpenAI?
OpenAI does not run an open program that pays companies for operational records. Its data partnerships page takes expressions of interest through a form, publishes no prices or terms and excludes information that belongs to a third party, which rules out most client and customer records. Companies with internal records can compare the buyers in our data buyers directory that publish prices, such as micro1 and Scale AI.
Comparing buyers?
Published payouts are ceilings, not quotes. We can put your records in front of several vetted buyers and compare offers on the same terms. Get a free valuation.
Sources
- Data partnerships, OpenAI, accessed November 2026
- OpenAI will reportedly pay $250 million to put News Corp's journalism in ChatGPT, Engadget, accessed November 2026
- OpenAI will pay Dotdash Meredith at least $16 million per year to license its content, Engadget, accessed November 2026
- OpenAI to pay Axel Springer tens of millions to use news content, Bloomberg Law, accessed November 2026
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OpenAI is listed for reference. We are independent and this page is not an endorsement. If anything here is out of date, email hello@sellmydatatoai.net and we will correct it.