Late Tuesday brought a bit of sad news from OpenAI, as AI Labs confirmed that it is delaying the launch of the much-hyped and much-heralded ChatGPT Advanced Voice Mode.

The new feature, which was first demonstrated in the company's Spring Update, was scheduled for early access and testing by a small group of ChatGPT Plus users in late June, with feedback to OpenAI.

However, this plan needs to be tweaked, as OpenAI has stated that it needs another month to reach the "hurdle to launch." This includes meeting safety requirements and ensuring that it responds in real time to even the most complex queries.

Some safety issues appeared to arise during testing, and the company stated in X that it is spending extra time improving the model's ability to detect and reject certain content. The company added that it is also working to improve the user experience and is expanding its systems to maintain real-time responsiveness.

Some users "should" have access next month, but most people with free or paid ChatGPT accounts will have to wait several months. For this reason, some choose to cancel ChatGPT Plus until the new mode is launched.

The company said that the exact schedule depends on meeting high standards of security and reliability; OpenAI said it will rely on previous groups to gather feedback and fine-tune ChatGPT according to what is needed.

This applies only to voice. Also, work is still in progress regarding ChatGPT's new video and screen sharing features.

OpenAI has stated that it will release more updates on the timeline in the future regarding the video and screen sharing feature, but has not provided specific details.

The company also highlighted some of the benefits of the new voice mode, writing: "ChatGPT's advanced voice mode can understand and respond to emotional and nonverbal cues, bringing you closer to real-time natural conversations with AI. Our mission is to thoughtfully bring these new experiences to you"

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Some users were unhappy with the delay; people on Reddit shared that they felt "played" and others claimed to have canceled their paid subscriptions to ChatGPT. They said they only signed up because they wanted to be the first to try these new features, but it appears to be a closed group.

Others complained to X, feeling like the rug had been pulled out from under their feet, and claimed that Advanced Voice was going the way of Sora.

OpenAI introduced back-and-forth conversational capabilities to ChatGPT in 2023, but GPT-4o's Advanced Voice tool was to add more expressiveness to AI responses and even pick up your speech patterns.

This is because GPT-4o now natively understands speech and can respond directly with voice. In previous versions, this was first converted to text, which caused a delay and made the conversation more jarring.

News of these new voice feature delays comes a month after OpenAI suspended ChatGPT's "Sky" voice after actress Scarlett Johansson accused the company of copying her voice; OpenAI has denied using her voice. .