OpenAI announced on Tuesday that it will shut down Sora, its text-to-video generation platform. The Sora team confirmed the closure in a post on X, thanking users for their contributions and acknowledging the news would be disappointing. The company said it will release further details soon, including shutdown timelines for both the app and its API, as well as guidance on how users can save their existing work.
OpenAI first unveiled Sora in February 2024 as a model capable of turning written text prompts into short video clips. The company later expanded the offering with Sora 2, a more advanced version released alongside a dedicated mobile app. The iOS application featured a social-style video feed and a tool called “cameos,” which allowed users to insert their own likeness and voice into AI-generated scenes after recording a brief clip.
Despite considerable anticipation around OpenAI’s entry into video generation, Sora proved to be a significant financial burden, reportedly costing the company around $15 million per day to operate. The decision to discontinue the product ends OpenAI’s standalone generative video offering. The company has not provided a detailed explanation for the closure beyond confirming the shutdown.
The announcement has had immediate consequences for a high-profile business relationship. A proposed $1 billion investment from Disney connected to Sora is no longer proceeding, according to a report by Deadline. In December, OpenAI and Disney had announced a three-year licensing agreement that would have allowed OpenAI to use roughly 250 Disney characters from franchises including Frozen, Star Wars, and Marvel in AI-generated videos. Sam Altman, OpenAI’s chief executive, had described the deal at the time as a model for how AI companies and creative industries could collaborate responsibly.
Disney said it respects OpenAI’s decision to exit the video-generation space and intends to continue exploring generative AI through other avenues. A Disney spokesperson was reported as saying the company valued the collaboration and would keep engaging with AI platforms in ways that respect intellectual property and the rights of creators. The statement signals that Disney remains open to AI partnerships despite the collapse of this particular arrangement.
Sora had also attracted scrutiny from legal experts and researchers since becoming widely available. Legal observers raised concerns that the system could reproduce recognizable characters and copyrighted material, posing intellectual property risks. Researchers flagged the potential for misuse in spreading misinformation, noting that the platform generated realistic-looking news footage depicting events that never occurred, including fabricated footage of Altman wearing a cat suit.
Critics further argued that tools designed to produce and distribute large volumes of low-quality synthetic media — sometimes referred to as AI slop — risked flooding the internet with misleading or worthless content. These concerns added to the pressure surrounding the platform even before its shutdown was announced. OpenAI did not respond to requests for comment on the closure at the time of reporting.
Originally reported by Decrypt.
