Sora
OpenAI's video model — app closed April 2026, API sunsets Sept 2026
Overview
Sora is OpenAI's text-to-video generation model, unveiled publicly in February 2024. It generates photorealistic video of up to 60 seconds from text descriptions, with a level of physical plausibility, cinematic coherence, and character consistency that significantly exceeded anything previously available. The current model, Sora 2 (released September 30, 2025), became the only version available after sora.com fully switched over in March 2026.
OpenAI shut this down in two stages: the consumer web/app was discontinued April 26, 2026 (citing roughly $1M/day operating cost against $2.1M in total lifetime revenue, a collapsed Disney licensing deal, and a profitability push ahead of an IPO), while the developer API is on a separate, later sunset scheduled for September 24, 2026 — meaning the API remains live today even though the consumer app is gone. Sora continues internally at OpenAI as a research project on "world models."
Pricing
Pricing shown for reference only. These figures reflect RECATOOLS research as of 1 Sep 2026 and may be out of date or incomplete. This is not financial or purchasing advice — always confirm the current price on the provider’s official website before making any decision.
- No longer available to new or existing users
- Video generation moved out of the standalone app
- 720p video at $0.10 per second generated
- No new API keys issued
- Shuts down 24 Sep 2026
- From $0.30 per second generated
- Higher resolutions cost more per second
- Existing keys only
Use cases
What you can produce with Sora
- A short photorealistic video (up to ~15s on Plus, ~25s on Pro for Sora 2; up to 20s on the original 2024 model) from a text prompt, with physics-accurate water, fire, or crowd motion
- A social-native vertical video clip (TikTok/Instagram Reels format) with synchronized dialogue and ambient sound effects generated in one pass
- A concept reel or pre-production storyboard animatic for pitching a film scene or ad campaign to clients
- A 'Cameo' personal video where the user's own likeness is inserted as a character into a generated scene
- A product visualization video animating a still image or design sketch into a short motion clip
- A stylized animated short — ranging from cinematic live-action to surreal or cartoon aesthetics — generated from a single descriptive prompt
- A multi-shot sequence with consistent character identity across three cuts, suitable for a brief narrative or brand story draft
Note: the consumer Sora product was discontinued 26 April 2026; only the developer API remains, sunsetting 24 September 2026.
Sora is winding down. The consumer app and sora.com were discontinued on April 26, 2026 — about seven months after the Sora 2 launch — and the API follows on September 24, 2026, so anything built on it needs a migration plan now. On raw capability the model sat near the top of AI video: strong physics, synchronized audio, and the Cameos feature were genuinely ahead of the field. But OpenAI couldn't make the economics work (reported ~$1M/day compute against $2.1M lifetime in-app revenue) and is refocusing on coding and enterprise products. Practical guidance: don't adopt. Existing API users should evaluate Google's Veo, Runway, or Kling before the September cutoff. The technology survives inside OpenAI as world-model research and will likely resurface elsewhere, but as a tool you can actually use, its clock has months left.
What people say
Few products have gone from No. 1 on the App Store to shut down in seven months. The Sora 2 app launched September 30, 2025, logged around 164,000 installs in its first 48 hours, passed a million downloads inside five days, and topped the US charts. By April 26, 2026 the consumer app and web experience were gone. OpenAI announced the two-stage wind-down on March 24, 2026; the developer API gets a longer runway, sunsetting September 24, 2026, so it still answers calls today.
The economics were the killer. Reported operating costs ran around $1M per day while in-app purchases produced about $2.1M over the product's entire life. Downloads peaked above 3.3M in November 2025 and fell to roughly 1.1M by February 2026; active users dropped from near 1M to under 500,000. A collapsed Disney licensing arrangement and OpenAI's pre-IPO profitability push — a broader retreat from consumer creative tools toward coding and enterprise — sealed it.
While it lived, testers genuinely rated the physics realism, synchronized audio, and Cameos (inserting yourself into generated scenes). Recurring gripes: short clip caps, weak character consistency across shots, restrictive guardrails, a demo-vs-reality gap on complex scenes, and the API arriving only two weeks after the app. No meaningful G2 or Capterra review base ever formed — this was a consumer app, rated in app stores, and it now reads as the case study in how brutal consumer AI video economics are. Sora continues inside OpenAI as world-model research.
Summary of public user & expert reviews, compiled by RECATOOLS.
Notable facts
- Sora's February 2024 preview demonstration shocked the film industry — directors at Sundance described the technology as 'existential' for traditional visual effects workflows.
- The model was trained partly on licensed video content from Shutterstock, making it one of the first major AI video models with a transparent content licensing strategy.
- Sora can generate video in the style of different camera lenses — from wide-angle drone shots to close-up handheld footage — responding to cinematography terminology in prompts.
Frequently asked questions
About this listing
This entry was compiled from publicly available data including Sora's official website, press releases, documentation, and reputable third-party publications. RECATOOLS is not affiliated with Sora unless explicitly stated.
Third-party AI tools update their pricing, features, availability, and policies frequently. Information here may be outdated by the time you read this — we make reasonable efforts to keep listings current, but cannot guarantee absolute accuracy.
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