Data shows that over the past year, despite ChatGPT's absolute user base growing by 50%, Gemini's growth rate reached 647%.
The market exhibits three major trends: competition shifting from a single dominant player to multiple strong contenders; 20% of users utilizing multiple applications; and products like Claude achieving differentiated competition through user stickiness, with average daily usage increasing from 10 minutes to over 30 minutes.
OpenAI's dominance in the AI chatbot market is being eroded by competitors. Mobile application data indicates that ChatGPT's market share among daily active users in the U.S. has significantly declined from 69.1% to 45.3% over the past year.$Alphabet-A (GOOGL.US)$Gemini and Musk’s Grok have achieved rapid growth, reshaping the competitive landscape.
According to data provided by Apptopia, a mobile app data analytics and intelligence service, to Big Technology on February 4, Gemini's market share climbed from 14.7% to 25.1% between January 2025 and January 2026, while Grok surged from 1.6% to 15.2%. This shift indicates that after a year of fierce competition, the AI chatbot market has transitioned from a single dominant player to a multi-player rivalry.
Despite the decline in its market share, ChatGPT's absolute number of users continues to grow. Data from Similarweb shows that visits to ChatGPT on desktop and mobile web platforms increased from 3.8 billion to 5.7 billion, representing a 50% rise. However, Gemini's growth was even more remarkable, with visits soaring from 267.7 million to 2 billion, an increase of 647%.
At the same time, users are showing a trend of using multiple platforms, with 20% utilizing more than two applications, and significant differences in usage duration—Claude users' average daily usage time has increased from 10 minutes to over 30 minutes, indicating that the market is moving toward differentiated competition.
ChatGPT’s Growth Slows as Competitors Accelerate
ChatGPT maintained robust growth for most of 2025 but experienced a traffic decline in November and December, coinciding with Gemini’s peak growth period.
David Carr, Editor of News and Research Insights at Similarweb, stated that ChatGPT's traffic slightly retreated after peaking at over 6 billion visits in October. Preliminary data suggests that ChatGPT’s traffic rebounded somewhat in January 2026 but has not yet returned to its peak level.
Meanwhile, Gemini continues to maintain strong growth momentum. According to preliminary estimates for January, Gemini’s traffic grew 17% month-over-month. This growth trajectory demonstrates that Google is successfully leveraging its advantages in search and mobile ecosystems to direct users toward its AI products.
The rise of Grok is equally remarkable. This chatbot, developed by Musk’s xAI, increased its market share from 1.6% to 15.2% within a year, growing nearly tenfold to become the third-largest player in the market.
Market growth is stabilizing, with a gap emerging between early adopters and mainstream users.
After experiencing rapid growth for much of 2025, the chatbot market has begun to stabilize in recent months.
Adam Blacker, director of public relations at Apptopia, stated that the market is flattening. Although generative AI applications have not yet reached their peak, this represents an early turning point where a gap may exist between early adopters and other users.
Data shows that most devices measured by Apptopia have never used chatbots, indicating that the market still has significant room for growth. The enthusiasm of early adopters propelled the development of generative AI in the years following the release of ChatGPT, but achieving widespread adoption will still take time.
Analysis indicates that this market characteristic means the AI chatbot industry is still in its early stages, and the competition for market share is far from over. Companies need to find effective ways to break through the circle of early adopters and reach mainstream users.
Users are showing a trend of using multiple platforms, with significant differences in usage duration.
The competition in the chatbot market is not a zero-sum game.
Data shows that by the end of 2025, 20% of chatbot users will use at least two applications, compared to only 5% at the end of 2023. This indicates that users are selecting different AI tools based on varying needs rather than being limited to a single platform.
Pure user numbers cannot fully reflect the market landscape, as there are significant differences in the amount of time users spend on different chatbots.
Although Anthropic's Claude lags far behind ChatGPT or Gemini in terms of user numbers, the time users spend on it has increased significantly, rising from an average of about 10 minutes per day in June 2025 to over 30 minutes currently.
This trend shows that the AI chatbot market is moving towards differentiated competition. User stickiness and depth of usage may better reflect the true value of a product than mere market share, providing survival space for smaller competitors focused on specific scenarios.
Editor/Melody
