Open AI finally fixed the most annoying thing about Chat GPT — and I'm already noticing the difference | Tech Radar

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Open AI finally fixed the most annoying thing about Chat GPT — and I'm already noticing the difference

GPT-5.5 Instant quietly changes how Chat GPT behaves, with shorter answers, fewer hallucinations, and a lot less emoji spam

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Open AI says GPT-5.5 Instant cuts hallucinations by 52.5%

Chat GPT responses are now shorter, cleaner, and less overformatted

New memory sources show exactly what Chat GPT knows about you

You think you know Chat GPT, right? It can be terribly sycophantic, produce endless bullet-point lists in response to your questions, and sometimes it even goes overboard with annoying emojis. Worst of all, it occasionally hallucinates — essentially making things up.

Well, Open AI is trying to change all of that overnight.

GPT-5.5 Instant is now rolling out to all Chat GPT users everywhere, including Free users. The previous GPT-5.3 Instant model will remain available for paid users through the Configure menu for the next three months.

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The headline features of GPT-5.5 Instant include 52.5% fewer hallucinated claims on high-stakes prompts across areas like medicine, law, and finance, alongside stronger performance in image reasoning, science, and math. Responses are also designed to be clearer, shorter, and less overformatted.

Open AI also says GPT-5.5 Instant has “a more natural conversational tone, and better use of the context you’ve already shared when personalization can help”.

That means Chat GPT is now better at using relevant context from past chats, uploaded files, and connected Gmail accounts.

New in GPT-5.5 Instant are memory sources. These give you more visibility into the context that helped personalize a response and let you manage or delete that memory source if it’s providing incorrect information.

When a response is personalized, you can now click the ‘Sources’ option at the end of the response to see what context was used. That could include saved memories, previous chats, or connected services.

You can then delete or correct outdated information using the three-dot menu next to the source.

So, if Chat GPT has incorrect information about where you live, for example, you can click the menu button and select ‘Make a correction’ to update it.

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Memory sources are rolling out across all Chat GPT consumer plans on the web and coming soon to mobile. Open AI says availability of specific personalization sources may vary by region.

I’ve been using GPT-5.5 Instant today, and the first thing I noticed was how concise it felt compared to the previous version I’d been using, GPT-5.3 Instant. And yes, that means Open AI has skipped GPT-5.4 Instant entirely in its jump to GPT-5.5.

Ask GPT-5.5 Instant for something, and it usually just gives you exactly what you asked for without anything superfluous. It no longer feels desperate to impress you every few sentences.

It also doesn’t make a habit of ending responses with unnecessary follow-up questions or overenthusiastic flourishes anymore. Everything feels cleaner, shorter, and less overformatted.

While GPT-5.5 Instant is available to all users, enhanced personalization from past chats, files, and connected Gmail accounts is currently rolling out only to Plus and Pro users on the web. Open AI says mobile support is coming soon, with plans to expand the feature to Free, Go, Business, and Enterprise users in the coming weeks.

GPT-5.5 Instant is not the kind of update that produces dramatic viral videos. Instead, it seems designed to remove friction from everyday use — making Chat GPT feel calmer, cleaner, and a little less eager to over-perform every second of the conversation. I prefer it.

That may not sound revolutionary, but for people who use AI tools every day, it could end up being one of Open AI’s most important upgrades yet.

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Graham is the Senior Editor for AI at Tech Radar. With over 25 years of experience in both online and print journalism, Graham has worked for various market-leading tech brands including Computeractive, PC Pro, i More, Mac Format, Mac|Life, Maximum PC, and more. He specializes in reporting on everything to do with AI and has appeared on BBC TV shows like BBC One Breakfast and on Radio 4 commenting on the latest trends in tech. Graham has an honors degree in Computer Science and spends his spare time podcasting and blogging.

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Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards