OpenAI drops plans to release an adult chatbot
TL;DR
OpenAI has indefinitely shelved plans for an erotic chatbot, reportedly called 'Citron Mode', following pressure from employees and investors.
Key Points
- The feature was first announced in October 2025 for a December release but was repeatedly delayed before being cancelled.
- Technical challenges in training models to handle explicit content – while filtering out illegal material like bestiality and incest – proved significant hurdles.
- OpenAI cited the need for long-term research on the effects of erotic AI interactions and user attachment before any release.
- This is the second app OpenAI has pulled this week, after shutting down its Sora video generator.
Nauti's Take
The death of 'Citron Mode' is less an ethical stand and more a tactical retreat – OpenAI simply underestimated the complexity. Trying to flip models that spent years learning to avoid explicit content is fighting against your own training data.
And reliably stripping out illegal material on top of that? That is not a feature you ship in a couple of months.
The simultaneous shutdown of Sora suggests a broader spring cleaning at OpenAI – clearing the deck before going all-in on GPT-5 and new product lines.
Sources
25.3.26
