The archive · Advertising · Marketing decision · 2025
OpenAI's first Super Bowl ad 'The Intelligence Age' puts ChatGPT among human inventions
OpenAI's first commercial, a 60-second pointillist Super Bowl film, places ChatGPT among humanity's great inventions and won Red Dot's 2025 TV Grand Prix.
OpenAI
What it had to solve
By early 2025 ChatGPT was a household name, but OpenAI had never run a TV commercial. The company wanted to invite everyday people, not just early adopters, to think about what AI could open up in their lives — and chose the Super Bowl, advertising's biggest moment, for its debut.
How it works
By February 2025, ChatGPT was already a household name, but OpenAI had never made a TV commercial. To speak to everyday people rather than early adopters, the company chose the biggest stage in advertising — a 60-second spot during Super Bowl LIX.
The film, 'The Intelligence Age,' was made by Accenture Song and production studio Builders Club using pointillism, the dotted aesthetic at the core of OpenAI's identity and the ChatGPT interface. Dots assemble into icons of human discovery, from early tools to the light bulb and computing, until the sequence lands on AI as the next step.
The claim was deliberately understated: AI appears as a tool in a long line of human tools. The making of the ad underlined the message — human creative professionals were behind it, with OpenAI's video model Sora used only for brainstorming and exploration.
Why it lands
- Putting ChatGPT at the end of a timeline of human milestones claimed a place in history without naming a single feature.
- Pointillism tied the film to OpenAI's existing identity, so the ad looked like the product rather than a generic tech commercial.
- Using humans to make the film echoed the message: AI as a tool that augments human creativity rather than replacing it.
What it did
The spot aired during Super Bowl LIX in February 2025 as OpenAI's first-ever TV commercial, immediately sparking public debate about a tech company placing AI inside humanity's timeline. Red Dot later awarded it the 2025 Grand Prix in TV Advertising at the Brands & Communication Design ceremony in Berlin.
What you can take
A category leader's first mass ad can skip features entirely: by staging ChatGPT inside a timeline of human tools, the film claimed a place in history that no spec sheet could match.
Since then
The Intelligence Age ran during Super Bowl LIX on 9 February 2025 and became one of the most discussed AI commercials of the year. At the Red Dot Gala in Berlin on 7 November 2025 it won the Grand Prix in TV Advertising, listed by Red Dot as 'Age of Intelligence' — OpenAI's first work in the awards archive.
Sources
- Red Dot Design Award: Age of Intelligence
- Builders Club and Accenture Song Get to the Point with ChatGPT 'The Intelligence Age'
- Award ceremony of the Red Dot Award: Brands & Communication Design 2025
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