ChatGPT now limits paid accounts per device. What “Device limit reached” means

What OpenAI changed

OpenAI’s help center has a new article, Understanding card and device limits in ChatGPT. It sets out two limits, which it calls part of ChatGPT’s “privacy and security protections”:

• A limit on buying. “If too many subscriptions are associated with the same payment card or device, ChatGPT may block a new subscription purchase.” Checkout then says: “Too many subscriptions associated with this card or device. We can’t complete this purchase.” OpenAI notes that this “is different from a bank decline.”
• A limit on using. “ChatGPT also limits how many paid accounts you can use on one device. If you see Device limit reached, you can’t use that paid account on this device.” The warning can come “when you sign in or be signed out after a later check, even if the purchase went through and the account worked at first.”

OpenAI’s release notes don’t mention the change; their latest entry, from October 30, is account switching in the iOS and Android apps. The article was already being cited on October 31, in a feature request to Cockpit Tools, an account manager on GitHub for Codex and other agents, and The Decoder reported it on November 1.

Which plans count

“Device limits apply to ChatGPT Go, ChatGPT Plus, ChatGPT Pro 100, ChatGPT Pro 200, and ChatGPT Pro 500 plans. ChatGPT Free and ChatGPT Business, Enterprise, and Edu workspace plans do not count toward the limit.”

Plan	Price a month	Counts toward the device limit
Free	$0	No
Go	OpenAI calls it “low-cost”	Yes
Plus	$20	Yes
Pro 100	$100	Yes
Pro 200	$200	Yes
Pro 500	$500	Yes
Business, Enterprise and Edu	Billed to the workspace	No

The prices are OpenAI’s, from its articles on Plus, Go and the Pro tiers. The common pairing of a personal plan and a work account in a company’s workspace is the one the rule leaves alone: only the personal plan counts.

What the warning means, and what it doesn’t

• It isn’t the account switcher’s limit. ChatGPT lets you “stay signed in to up to 2 ChatGPT accounts at a time” on the web and in the phone apps, says its account switching article. The device article says “Device limits are separate from account switching limits,” and “signing out of an account does not guarantee that another paid account becomes eligible.” On October 31, OpenAI’s Thibault Sottiaux posted: “You can now easily switch between multiple accounts on mobile, and coming soon to desktop too.” So the switcher’s two accounts aren’t a promise that two paid accounts will work on one device.
• It isn’t a usage limit. “A usage limit affects how much you can use on a subscription you already have.” And “Buying credits or resetting usage won’t clear a card or device restriction.”
• It isn’t a sign of a break-in. “A blocked purchase or a device-limit warning alone doesn’t mean someone accessed your account without permission.”
• It can catch people who share. “If multiple people use the same payment card, the card can reach the checkout limit even when each person uses a different device. A shared household or public device can also reach a limit when people use their own accounts.”

Who it’s aimed at

OpenAI doesn’t say. The Decoder’s reading is that “The policy will likely hit users who’ve been switching between multiple paid accounts on one device to squeeze more usage out of cheap flat-rate subscriptions.” Two Plus plans cost $40 a month. The next plan up, Pro 100, costs $100, and Pro plans “currently have no five-hour limit” in Work and Codex, says OpenAI’s Codex pricing.

OpenAI’s terms already forbid trying to “circumvent any rate limits or restrictions,” and OpenAI hasn’t said whether a second paid plan bought for more Codex usage counts. On any one device, the new limit caps it in practice, wherever the cap sits.

Apps that switch between Codex accounts are adjusting. The October 31 request to Cockpit Tools asks it to mark accounts hit by the limit, instead of showing a general sign-in error, and to tell users plainly that removing an account “only deletes local records and doesn’t guarantee freeing OpenAI’s server-side device quota” (our translation from the Chinese). It also notes that OpenAI hasn’t published a way to see or release the slots a device uses.

What to do if you see it

1. Check the account. OpenAI’s first step is to “Check that the warning shows your account.”
2. Use another account you own. “Select Log into another account and sign in with another permitted account you own.”
3. Or cancel and get a refund. For subscriptions billed through ChatGPT or Google Play, choose the warning’s cancellation and refund option, and OpenAI will “cancel the affected subscriptions and start your refund.” The request “may affect multiple subscriptions on your account, and paid access ends immediately when cancellation succeeds.” For Apple purchases, cancel and request the refund from Apple. “Seeing the warning does not mean a refund has been processed or the subscription canceled.”
4. Don’t cancel a working subscription to swap it. “Subscriptions purchased before these restrictions take effect can continue under the existing-subscription exception; canceling one does not guarantee you can replace it.”
5. If you think it’s a mistake, ask Support to review it. Say whether you share the card or the device. Include the warning text or a screenshot, the account’s email and sign-in method, the subscription ID if one is shown, the plan, the app or website, when it happened with your time zone, and whether you were charged. “Do not share passwords, one-time codes, or full payment-card details.”

What OpenAI hasn’t said

• The numbers. How many paid accounts one device allows, and how many subscriptions one card can hold.
• What a device is. Whether a browser, the ChatGPT desktop app, the Codex CLI and a phone count as one device or several, and how long a device keeps its slots.
• The start date. When “these restrictions take effect,” which decides whose subscriptions fall under the existing-subscription exception, and how long that exception lasts.

If you used more than one account for Codex

OpenAI’s routes to more usage are on the account you keep. You can upgrade, buy credits in Settings > Usage in ChatGPT or Usage & Billing in the Codex app, or use a reset already on the account. Credits “pay for eligible usage after included limits are reached. They do not unlock models your plan cannot access, combine subscriptions, or transfer usage between accounts.” From December, Plus, Pro and Business plans’ “usage allowance will be shared across ChatGPT and Codex,” says OpenAI’s usage article, though “Instant chat will not draw from your usage,” as our memo on it explains. Our Codex usage limit guide compares the other ways to keep coding.

Enjoy runs Codex on your ChatGPT plan beside Claude Code and the other labs’ agents, and it keeps several Codex accounts signed in, moving a conversation to one with usage left. OpenAI’s rule is per device, so on your computer it applies in Enjoy as it does everywhere else, and Enjoy can’t get a blocked account past it. Two setups are untouched:

• A personal plan and a work account. Business, Enterprise and Edu don’t count toward the limit, and Enjoy can give each project its own account, so work stays on the work plan.
• A second lab instead of a second ChatGPT plan. When Codex runs out, switch the conversation to another agent, such as Claude Code on a Claude plan or a free local model through OpenCode, and it catches up on the work so far.

Enjoy doesn’t change OpenAI’s limits or add usage to a ChatGPT plan. It’s a monthly subscription, with the first seven days free (pricing).

We’ll update this memo if OpenAI publishes the numbers or changes the rules.