OpenAI now limits how many paid ChatGPT accounts one device or card can use, closing the multi-subscription route to more Codex usage

OpenAI has started capping how many paid ChatGPT accounts can be bought with one payment card and used on one device. The rules are spelled out in a new Help Center article, Understanding card and device limits in ChatGPT, which the page marks as updated three days ago. There was no announcement.

The article describes two separate checks:

• At checkout. "If too many subscriptions are associated with the same payment card or device, ChatGPT may block a new subscription purchase." The message is "Too many subscriptions associated with this card or device. We can't complete this purchase," and OpenAI stresses that this is not a bank decline.
• At sign-in. "ChatGPT also limits how many paid accounts you can use on one device." Past the limit, the account shows Device limit reached, and the warning can appear "when you sign in or be signed out after a later check, even if the purchase went through and the account worked at first."

The limits apply to Go, Plus, Pro 100, Pro 200 and Pro 500. Free accounts and Business, Enterprise and Edu workspaces don't count. OpenAI doesn't say what the number is.

Who this is aimed at

The article doesn't say why the limits exist beyond calling them part of ChatGPT's "privacy and security protections". Its advice makes the target fairly clear, though. If you need more usage, it says, buy credits on an account you already have (Settings > Usage in ChatGPT, or Usage & Billing in the Codex app), and it adds that credits "do not unlock models your plan cannot access, combine subscriptions, or transfer usage between accounts." Buying credits or resetting usage "won't clear a card or device restriction."

In other words, stacking several cheap paid accounts on one machine to multiply Codex or ChatGPT allowances is what the rule stops. That practice became common during October's run of near-daily Codex limit resets, and it matters more now that OpenAI has confirmed that ChatGPT and Codex will draw from one token-based allowance from December.

Signing out doesn't free a slot: "signing out of an account does not guarantee that another paid account becomes eligible." Subscriptions bought before the restrictions took effect "can continue under the existing-subscription exception", but cancelling one "does not guarantee you can replace it."

The same week as account switching

The timing is the odd part. On October 31, Codex lead Thibault Sottiaux (Tibo) used his Day 26 update, the same post that announced two banked Codex resets, to say that "you can now easily switch between multiple accounts on mobile, and coming soon to desktop too." The companion article, Using multiple ChatGPT accounts on web and mobile, allows up to two signed-in accounts with switching between them, rolling out on iOS and Android. A newly added second account starts on Free, and each account keeps its own plan.

The device-limit article separates the two: "Device limits are separate from account switching limits." Switching is meant for people who have, say, a personal and a work account. Several paid personal accounts on one phone or laptop is what the new limit is for.

Collateral cases

OpenAI acknowledges that legitimate users can hit the limits. "If multiple people use the same payment card, the card can reach the checkout limit even when each person uses a different device," and "a shared household or public device can also reach a limit when people use their own accounts." Such users are told to contact Support and say the card or device is shared.

If a paid account gets the warning, the options are to sign in to another permitted account, or to cancel and get a refund. For subscriptions billed through ChatGPT or Google Play, the refund option is in the warning itself, and paid access ends immediately once cancellation succeeds. Apple purchases have to be cancelled and refunded through Apple.

What the article doesn't say

• The numbers. Neither the card limit nor the per-device limit is published. Unofficial tests circulating on X put the device limit at around three paid accounts, but OpenAI hasn't confirmed any figure.
• What counts as a device. The article doesn't explain how a device is identified, or whether a browser and the desktop app on the same computer count once or twice.
• The start date. "Before these restrictions take effect" implies a cutoff, but the article gives no date.