Sora Beats ChatGPT’s First-Week Record on the App Store

Earlier today it was discovered that new statistics from app intelligence company Appfigures now shows that OpenAI’s video-generating app Sora officially had a bigger first week than ChatGPT on iOS when it surged to the top of the U.S. App Store. It estimates that during the first seven days after its launch, Sora received 627,000 iOS downloads, while ChatGPT received 606,000 iOS downloads in the first week.

OpenAI’s Sora chief, Bill Peebles, revealed on X formerly Twitter, shortly after this article’s publication that Sora had a million downloads in less than five days. He claimed that even though Sora was in invite-only mode, it was quicker than ChatGPT. (At this time, Sora is limited to iOS.)

During its first week of its launch, ChatGPT was solely accessible in the United States, whereas Sora was initially available in both the United States and Canada. Although Appfigures statistics showed that Canada contributed over 45,000 installs, if the data had been based solely on U.S. stats, the Sora launch would have accounted for almost 96% of ChatGPT’s iOS debut.

Given that ChatGPT was initially accessible to the general public, whereas Sora requires an invitation to access, this degree of customer acceptance is noteworthy. Sora’s performance is all the more amazing because of this.

With 56,000 iOS app installs on its first day, Sora quickly rose to the third-ranked overall app on the U.S. App Store, according to Appfigures. On Friday, October 3, it peaked at number one. The high spike has already placed Sora’s debut on pace with xAI’s Grok launch and ahead of other significant AI software releases, such as Microsoft’s Copilot and Anthropic’s Claude.

The other anecdotes that boost Appfigures’ data that can be found by just scanning social media. Users can create convincing deepfakes with Sora videos, which use the updated Sora 2 video model. These films appear to be widely available. The late actor Robin Williams’ daughter, Zelda Williams, has asked people to stop sending her AI-generated pictures of her father because users are even making deepfakes of deceased persons.

OpenAI had stated that the Sora 2 will be free at first however there will be need for customers to eventually have the opportunity to “pay some amount to generate an extra video if there’s too much demand relative to available compute.”

Here is the data statistics from Appfigures, from day 1, when it was launch and the daily downloads on daily basis till Oct 6th and bringing the total to about 1million downloads.

Since its launch on September 30, 2025, the app has shown consistent uptake, according to Appfigures. On October 1, 2025, daily downloads on iOS reached a record-breaking 107,800 downloads, according to its data. Since then, the daily installs have fluctuated between lows of 84,400 on October 6 and highs of 98,500 on October 4. 

Also with the introduction, the Sora app for iOS, which allows users to both produce their own videos using OpenAI’s new Sora 2 model and browse via a feed of AI-generated videos. With its “cameos” feature, users can also add their own or a friend’s image to an AI video. The app is packed with memes, OpenAI personnel deepfaking themselves, and what can only be described as AI-generated trash, according to my colleague Hayden Field.

Even if it’s not quite as high as it was earlier in the week, those are still respectable statistics for an app that isn’t yet available to everyone.

Users started creating copyrighted characters in situations that were not brand-friendly, which prompted reaction against the Sora app and forced OpenAI to grant those copyright holders more control over their content. Also users can now specify how their likeness is used in Sora, says the company.

Peebles stated, “The team is working hard to keep up with the surging growth.” “More features and overmoderation fixes are coming soon!”