ChatGPT Ads in Singapore and South-East Asia (2026)

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What opened on 23 September Market by market Eligibility: who can buy, and where they can show Currency and billing: known and unknown Agency route vs self-serve Category restrictions Creative for multilingual markets A 2-week launch checklist for a Singapore DTC brand Changelog Sources FAQ

Last verified: 2026-10-13. Facts are dated, third-party-only facts are marked "reported", and the changelog is at the bottom. Status for every market lives in the ChatGPT Ads guide.

ChatGPT Ads opened to advertisers in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam (plus Taiwan) on 23 September 2026, in an expansion OpenAI announced. A business whose billed legal entity is registered in one of those countries can open a self-serve Ads Manager account now, or buy through one of five named agency groups. The local detail (currencies, language handling, category rules) is only partly documented, so this page separates what OpenAI said from what trackers report.

LocalAds is not an OpenAI partner and does not place ads. We make the 1:1 creative you upload, which is why the examples below are real ads from our ChatGPT Ads studio, not screenshots of live placements.

What opened on 23 September

OpenAI's post, ChatGPT Ads expands to Southeast Asia and Taiwan, said ads "are rolling out in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, and Taiwan", taking the channel past 60 countries; the table now lists 63. Singapore trade title Marketing-Interactive gave 24 September as the local start, which PPC Land puts down to time zones.

Per OpenAI's post, as summarised by PPC Land:

Self-serve from day one in all seven markets, not just managed buys.
Agency partners: dentsu, Havas Media, Omnicom Media, Publicis Groupe and WPP. Havas was not on the India roster three weeks earlier.
A commerce partner: Shopee, which runs marketplaces in all seven, called OpenAI "a strategic partner".

The Index Lab tracker (updated 12 October) shows ads serving in all seven. The audience is the same as everywhere: logged-in adults on the Free and Go tiers. Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise and Education are ad-free.

Market by market

Market	Opened	ChatGPT Go price (Jan 2026 reporting)	Reported min. daily budget	Languages likely in prompts	Selling seasons
Singapore	23 Sep 2026	SG$13 / month	SGD 4.00	English and Singlish, Mandarin, Malay, Tamil	11.11, 12.12, Lunar New Year (6 Feb 2027)
Malaysia	23 Sep 2026	Not reported	MYR 5.50	Malay, English, Mandarin, Tamil	11.11, 12.12, Lunar New Year, Ramadan (from about 8 Feb 2027), Hari Raya Aidilfitri (about 9 to 10 Mar 2027)
Indonesia	23 Sep 2026	Not reported	IDR 14,000	Bahasa Indonesia, English	11.11, 12.12 (Harbolnas), Ramadan, Lebaran
Philippines	23 Sep 2026	Not reported	PHP 50	Filipino, English, Taglish	11.11, 12.12, the long Christmas season
Thailand	23 Sep 2026	259 baht / month	THB 33	Thai, English	11.11, 12.12, Songkran (13 to 15 April)
Vietnam	23 Sep 2026	132,000 dong / month	VND 19,000	Vietnamese	11.11, 12.12, Tet (6 Feb 2027)
Taiwan	23 Sep 2026	Not reported	TWD 60	Traditional Chinese	Double 11, 12.12, Lunar New Year

Reading the table:

Go prices are user subscription prices from Marketing-Interactive's January 2026 reporting, cited by PPC Land. They matter because Go users see ads, so a cheap Go tier widens the ad-eligible audience.
Minimum budgets are reported, not confirmed. On 24 September PPC Land found none of these currencies in OpenAI's minimum-spend table. Index Lab's cost guide, updated 12 October, says the table grew to 30 currencies by late September and lists the figures above. OpenAI's help centre blocks automated access, so confirm in Ads Manager.
Ramadan and Eid dates depend on moon sighting. Lunar New Year and the start of Ramadan land two days apart in February 2027, so Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia get two gifting peaks with different messages at once.

Eligibility: who can buy, and where they can show

Eligibility follows the billed entity. PPC Land quotes OpenAI's rule that the billed legal entity must be "based in a country marked as available". Index Lab adds (reported): verification runs through Persona, which matches the business against public records, and the payment card must belong to the business and bill in the account's country. A personal card is the most common reason verification stalls.

Home country first. Some new accounts can target only their home country until verification clears and they have spent enough there (reported; no published threshold). A Singapore brand selling into Malaysia should run Singapore first and treat Malaysia as week three or later. Buying and serving are separate settings; more in where ChatGPT ads are available.

Currency and billing: known and unknown

Bid guidance is in US dollars. The reported starting point is a $3 to $5 maximum CPC, with CPMs cited from $18 to $65 by topic (third-party). Index Lab says you are charged in the account currency and that country and currency are fixed at setup (reported), so choose deliberately.
Local floors look low. If the Index Lab figures hold, Singapore's daily floor (SGD 4) is a fraction of the US $25, and Vietnam's is under a dollar. That is not a reason to run a tiny budget: at $3 to $5 a click, a few dollars a day teaches you nothing.
Not documented anywhere we could find: how GST or local VAT appears on invoices, whether self-serve invoicing exists in the region, and how cross-border cards are treated beyond the same-country rule.
Measurement gap. PPC Land notes that AppsFlyer and Adjust attribution for ChatGPT Ads covers seven other countries but none of these. App advertisers should plan web-to-app flows.

Budget planning in more depth: how much ChatGPT ads cost.

Agency route vs self-serve

Self-serve suits a DTC brand with one or two markets, a product page that converts, and a buyer comfortable with a beta tool. You control context hints and creative rotation and learn faster.

An agency suits brands launching several markets at once, wanting invoicing, already buying through dentsu, Havas, Omnicom, Publicis or WPP, or in a category that may need a policy conversation. It does not change eligibility or category rules.

Either way, creative is your job.

A ChatGPT conversation where someone says office aircon dries their skin despite Singapore's humidity and asks for a gentle face cleanser; below the answer, a Sponsored card from CeraVe shows a square image of the Hydrating Facial Cleanser bottle, the title Barrier Care Wash and the line Ceramides help protect normal to dry skin

A real ad made in the LocalAds ChatGPT Ads studio for CeraVe. Image, title (17 characters) and copy (41) are unedited output from the product page; the Singapore conversation is our mockup, not a live placement.

Category restrictions

As Index Lab describes OpenAI's policy (reported, 12 October):

Open by default: consumer goods, local services, travel and entertainment, digital products and education, and fitness, nutrition and wellness products with no medical claim.
US only, case by case: finance, health (including supplements) and legal. Closed in all seven markets here.
Closed everywhere: alcohol above 0.5% ABV, tobacco and vaping, gambling, adult content and dating, political ads, counterfeits, unproven health claims.

Skincare sits near the health line: "ceramides help protect" describes a product; "treats eczema" is a medical claim. Local rules apply on top. PPC Land flags Indonesia's new data protection regulation (from January 2027) and Vietnam's Decree 356/2025/ND-CP, both relevant to pixels and forms on landing pages.

Creative for multilingual markets

Confirmed: nothing from OpenAI, that we could find, on whether Ads Manager accepts titles and copy in Thai, Vietnamese, Bahasa or Chinese, or how the 24 and 48 character guidance applies to Thai or Traditional Chinese script. PPC Land called language "the untested variable" for this wave.

Reported: on 16 September OpenAI added an opt-in text customisation setting that adapts your headline and description to the conversation and translates them into the user's preferred language (PPC Land). If it works as described, an English card can reach a Bahasa conversation without Bahasa copy. It also means users may not see your exact words, so keep source copy to claims you are happy to see rephrased.

What we would do this month:

Write plain English source copy, one concrete claim per line, no idioms. Plain claims translate; puns do not.
Keep text out of the image. No setting can translate a baked-in headline.
Write context hints in the languages people type. A Malaysian shopper may ask for "pencuci muka kulit kering" as easily as "dry skin face wash", and hints match conversation text.
Test local-language copy as a separate ad in the same ad group, and check the rendered card for truncation.

Field limits are in our specs page; the free ChatGPT ad preview shows how a pair wraps before upload.

A ChatGPT conversation asking for a light tea to keep at a desk in a Singapore office; below an answer about first flush Darjeeling, a Sponsored card from Dorje Teas shows a kraft tea pouch on a yellow background, the title Spring Darjeeling and the line Light floral cup from first spring harvest

Generated in our ChatGPT Ads studio from Dorje Teas' product page, with square, title (17) and copy (42) left as they came out. The office chat is a mockup. Nothing in the image needs translating.

A 2-week launch checklist for a Singapore DTC brand

One Singapore entity, one hero product, live before 11.11.

Days 1 to 3: account and policy

Open the account in the entity's legal name with a company card billed in Singapore. Choose the currency deliberately.
Check the hero product and landing page against the ad policy; strip medical and comparative claims from both.
Point the ad at a fast mobile page that answers the question, not your homepage.

Days 4 to 7: creative and hints

Produce 6 to 10 squares: clean packshots plus two or three simple in-context shots, no headlines.
Write 3 to 5 title and copy pairs inside 24 and 48 characters, one angle each (benefit, ingredient, use case, occasion).
Write 15 to 30 context hints (situations, needs, local phrasing) and negative phrases for conversations you do not want.

Days 8 to 10: launch

One campaign, Singapore only, two or three ad groups by angle, CPC bids at the reported $3 to $5 equivalent.
Budget for signal: roughly 20 to 30 clicks a day per ad group, so about US$60 to US$150 a day per group, not the floor.

Days 11 to 14: read and adjust

Cut clearly weaker squares and lines; keep at least three live per group.
Add hints from converting conversations and negatives from the rest.
Build the 12.12 and Lunar New Year sets now. Our Black Friday and holiday plan covers the same calendar logic.

Full setup steps: how to create ads for ChatGPT.

A ChatGPT conversation asking for a gentle cleanser for dry skin after long days outdoors in Kuala Lumpur; below the answer, a Sponsored card from CeraVe shows the cleanser bottle on a pale aqua background, the title Hydrating Cleanser and the line Cleans without tightness for dry skin

A second CeraVe angle, unedited studio output (title 18 characters, copy 37) under a mocked-up Kuala Lumpur chat. Two angles, two backgrounds, one product: the minimum variety worth testing.

Changelog

2026-10-14: First published: the 23 September opening, reported local minimum budgets, the opt-in translation setting, category rules and a two-week Singapore launch plan.

Sources

OpenAI, ChatGPT Ads expands to Southeast Asia and Taiwan, 23 September 2026. OpenAI blocks automated fetching, so quotes and partner names are as reported by PPC Land.
PPC Land, OpenAI gains 7 Asian markets for ChatGPT Ads, 24 September 2026: partners, Shopee, eligibility wording, Marketing-Interactive's start date and Go prices, currencies, languages, measurement.
Index Lab, availability tracker, cost guide and eligibility guide, updated 12 October 2026.
Common Thread Collective, ChatGPT Ads October 2026, 1 October 2026. It cites regional AI-shopping and CPM figures without sources, so we have not repeated them.
OpenAI, Ads Manager availability, the authoritative country table.

FAQ

Is ChatGPT Ads available in Singapore? Yes, since 23 September 2026 (24 September local time, per Marketing-Interactive). A business whose billed legal entity is registered in Singapore can open a self-serve account; new accounts may only target Singapore at first.

Which South-East Asian countries have ChatGPT ads? Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, plus Taiwan, all from the same day. They are among 63 markets as of 2026-10-13. Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Brunei are not on the table.

Can I pay for ChatGPT ads in Singapore dollars? Reported, not confirmed. Index Lab lists a SGD 4.00 daily minimum in OpenAI's expanded currency table; on 24 September PPC Land found no South-East Asian currency listed. Bid guidance is in US dollars.

Can I write ChatGPT ad copy in Malay, Thai, Vietnamese or Bahasa Indonesia? We found no OpenAI statement either way. What is reported is an opt-in setting, added 16 September, that adapts and translates your headline and description into the user's language. Until local copy is documented, write plain English, keep text out of the image, and add local-language context hints.

Do I need an agency to run ChatGPT ads in South-East Asia? No. Self-serve was open in all seven markets from day one. OpenAI named dentsu, Havas, Omnicom, Publicis and WPP for brands that want managed buying or invoicing.

Which categories are restricted in South-East Asia? Finance, health and legal are reported as US-only, so closed here. Alcohol, tobacco and vaping, gambling, dating and political ads are closed everywhere. Local advertising and data rules apply on top.

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