Amid rising scrutiny over its ties with the U.S. defense establishment, OpenAI has introduced its latest model, GPT-5.3 Instant, promising higher accuracy and “less cringe” in conversations.
The ChatGPT-maker said GPT-5.3 Instant reduces unnecessary refusals and cuts down on “preachy” disclaimers. The model is designed to offer sharper contextual understanding, better grasp of subtext, and a more consistent tone during chats.
“GPT-5.3 Instant significantly reduces unnecessary refusals, while toning down overly defensive or moralizing preambles before answering the question,” the company said in a blog post. It added, “GPT-5.3 Instant also improves the quality of answers when information comes from the web. It more effectively balances what it finds online with its own knowledge and reasoning—for example, using its existing understanding to contextualize recent news rather than simply summarizing search results.”
OpenAI also reported lower hallucination rates. Based on user-feedback evaluations, hallucinations dropped by 22.5% with web use and by 9.6% without web access. The model is now available to all users in ChatGPT.
The launch comes at a sensitive time. Rival firm Anthropic is in a dispute with the U.S. government after U.S. President Donald Trump ordered agencies to phase out Claude. The move followed Anthropic’s refusal to revise its safeguarding policy related to AI use in autonomous weapons and mass surveillance.
“Our strong preference is to continue to serve the Department and our warfighters—with our two requested safeguards in place,” Anthropic said in a February 26 blog post.
On February 28, OpenAI announced an agreement with the U.S. Department of War to deploy advanced AI systems in classified environments. However, conflicting statements from OpenAI and the government about how the AI may be used have triggered user backlash, particularly over concerns related to surveillance and autonomous weapons.
Anthropic’s stance appears to have strengthened its public image. Its Claude chatbot recently surpassed ChatGPT in U.S. phone app downloads over the past week, according to data from Sensor Tower.
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