Why the OpenAI extension to the GPT-4 API means apps will be even more powerful

Expanding access to the GPT-4 API will allow developers to create more powerful apps and services than are available today.

OpenAI announced it will extend the availability of GPT-4 to all paying API users and phase out older embedding models. This change gives developers the ability to create even more powerful software and plugins than are available today.

What is GPT-4 API and why is it important?

API stands for Application Programming Interface, a way for two software programs to interact with each other.

It works like a secure bridge between two software programs, allowing them to exchange information between them.

The GPT-4 API allows developers to create new software that can harness the power of GPT-4 in useful contexts.

This means that more powerful interactions will become available to consumers as more developers gain access.

Availability of GPT-4 for API users


OpenAI’s announcement means that all developers in good standing with OpenAI will have access to the more powerful GPT-4 API.

This development is important because it means that services and products that depend on the API will themselves become more powerful and capable of more.

According to OpenAI:

“GPT-4 is our most capable model. Millions of developers have requested access to the GPT-4 API since March, and the range of innovative products leveraging GPT-4 is growing every day.

Today all existing API developers with a history of successful payments can access the GPT-4 API with 8K context.

We plan to open up access to new developers by the end of this month, and then start raising rate-limits after that depending on compute availability.

Based on the stability and readiness of these models for production-scale use, we are also making the GPT-3.5 Turbo, DALL·E and Whisper APIs generally available.

We are working on safely enabling fine-tuning for GPT-4 and GPT-3.5 Turbo and expect this feature to be available later this year.”

https://openai.com/blog/gpt-4-api-general-availability

Chat Completions API

An article published on Medium described the significance of Chat Completions as revolutionary:

“This feature allows developers to describe functions to the AI models, which can then intelligently decide to output a JSON object containing arguments to call those functions.

…It opens up a world of possibilities for creating more interactive and dynamic applications.”

https://medium.com/@s_eschweiler/revolutionizing-ai-interactions-unpacking-openais-function-calling-capability-in-the-chat-b0a6b71a9452

OpenAI’s announcement explained why Chat Completions will become the default:

“…the Chat Completions API’s structured interface (e.g., system messages, function calling) and multi-turn conversation capabilities enable developers to build conversational experiences and a broad range of completion tasks.

It also helps lower the risk of prompt injection attacks, since user-provided content can be structurally separated from instructions.”

https://openai.com/blog/gpt-4-api-general-availability

The announcement states that OpenAI will do away with the older Completions API and advocate moving to the newer Chat Completions API.

The Chat Completions API, introduced in March 2023, enables more powerful interactions and now accounts for 97% of API GPT usage.


OpenAI will phase out older models in six months, and older completion models will no longer be available starting in January 2024.

This is to allow developers to upgrade their products and services that use the old models to take advantage of the new models. The same is true for developers using the older embedding models.

OpenAI will cover the financial costs of the transition

They promised:

“We will cover the financial cost of users re-embedding content with these new models.

We will be in touch with impacted users over the coming days.”

https://openai.com/blog/gpt-4-api-general-availability

OpenAI’s statement recognizes that the transition from the older models is a significant change.
OpenAI remains innovative and continues to improve

OpenAI continues to stay ahead of the competition, enabling companies to develop and improve new products and services.

This means that more powerful tools will be available to consumers down the road.

These changes are important because they allow users to do more with access to GPT-4.

Read the announcement from OpenAI: https://openai.com/blog/gpt-4-api-general-availability

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