Text-to-video app Sora surges past 1 million downloads as OpenAI races to meet demand
OpenAI’s text-to-video app Sora has reached over one million downloads in less than five days, according to Sora boss Bill Peebles on X.
Peebles said the milestone came faster than ChatGPT’s initial launch, despite Sora’s invite-only rollout and it currently only being available in North America.
He added that the team is “working hard to keep up with surging growth” and that new features and fixes to address over-moderation are on the way.
The news comes a few days after we reported that OpenAI's Sora 2 was available for everyone on Invideo, regardless of location and without waitlists.
Sora soars
The app, which converts text prompts into realistic ten-second videos, has quickly climbed to the top of the Apple App Store charts in the US.
Its viral growth has flooded social media feeds with user-created clips, highlighting both the appeal and controversy of AI-generated video, which is everywhere these days.
According to the BBC, Sora’s ease of use and shareability have encouraged a wave of creative experimentation, but the technology has also drawn criticism for how it handles depictions of public figures and copyrighted material.
Several videos circulating online have portrayed deceased celebrities such as Michael Jackson and Tupac Shakur, raising ethical concerns about consent and the digital use of likenesses.
The BBC reported that Robin Williams’s daughter, Zelda Williams, recently urged people to stop sharing AI-generated videos of her late father, linking her plea to the growing trend sparked by Sora’s popularity.
Several companies developing their own generative AI systems are already facing lawsuits over the use of copyrighted works in training datasets. The BBC noted that rival AI firm Anthropic had recently agreed to pay $1.5bn to settle a case brought by authors who alleged their work had been used without permission.
What do you think about Sora’s rapid rise? Let us know in the comments.
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