Since its launch in November 2022, ChatGPT has become a global phenomenon. The artificial intelligence tool has seen unprecedented adoption, but the extent of its integration into our lives often exceeds imagination. With 700 million users—nearly 10% of the global adult population—sending 18 billion messages per week according to the most recent data, its ubiquity is undeniable. We often imagine professionals using it to write reports or developers to debug code.
But what if these assumptions, although plausible, only tell part of the story? A recent working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), based on the analysis of millions of real conversations, sheds light on our actual habits with ChatGPT. And the results are surprising, to say the least.
In this article, I invite you to discover five of the most counterintuitive and striking revelations from this study. The data tells a much more nuanced story than the media headlines suggest.
1. Forget productivity: ChatGPT is first and foremost a personal tool.
Contrary to the intense media focus on the impact of AI in the workplace, the reality of the data is clear: ChatGPT is mainly used for personal reasons.
The key statistic from the study is striking. The proportion of non-work-related messages in consumer subscriptions rose from 53% to 73% of total usage in one year. The growth in personal usage was much faster than that of professional usage.
Why is this so important? It suggests that the greatest impact of AI may not be in our offices, but in our personal lives, in our learning and in our homes.
2. The gender gap in tech? The ChatGPT exception
One of the most unexpected findings of the study concerns the demographics of its users. While new technologies are often marked by an initial imbalance in favour of men, ChatGPT has followed a radically different trajectory.
In the first few months after its launch, users with typically male first names accounted for around 80% of active users. However, this trend has completely reversed. According to data from June 2025, this share had fallen to 48%. In other words, active users were now slightly more likely to have typically female first names.
This near disappearance of the gender gap is a rare phenomenon in the technology sector. It demonstrates the accessibility and universal appeal of the tool, which has been remarkably effective in transcending traditional demographic barriers.
3. The two biggest myths about its use
Discussions about ChatGPT are often dominated by two flagship use cases. However, the study data shows that their importance is greatly overestimated.
Myth number one: ChatGPT is primarily a coding assistant. Despite the hype surrounding AI as a programming aid, the figures tell a different story. Computer programming accounts for only 4.2% of messages sent to ChatGPT. This is a significant proportion, but far from the dominant use that one might imagine.
Second myth: ChatGPT is used as an emotional companion. The idea of using AI as emotional support is often put forward. However, data shows that this practice remains marginal. Only 1.9% of messages relate to "Relationships and Personal Reflection", and barely 0.4% are dedicated to "Games and Role-Playing".
4. He is asked to "think" more than to "do".
To better understand our intentions, the study proposes a new classification of our requests, divided into two main categories: "Asking" and "Doing". "Asking" corresponds to searching for information or advice in order to make a decision, while "Doing" corresponds to a request for the AI to perform a specific task, such as writing an e-mail.
Overall, the distribution is fairly balanced, with approximately 49% of messages classified as "Asking" and 40% as "Doing". However, an underlying trend emerges, revealing crucial information about the value we derive from the tool.
Crucially, the study reveals that the "Asking" category has grown faster than "Doing" over the past year and that its responses are rated higher in quality by users. This means that we are increasingly using ChatGPT as a "co-pilot" for thinking and decision-making, rather than just as an automated "colleague" that performs tasks. The real added value seems to lie in its ability to help us think better.
5. At work, ChatGPT is more of an editor than an author.
When looking at professional use, writing is by far the most common use case, accounting for 40% of all work-related messages, according to figures from June 2025. But here too, these figures need to be qualified.
The most surprising finding is that approximately two-thirds of writing messages consist of requests to modify text provided by the user, such as editing, critiquing, summarising, or translating.
In other words, professionals mainly use ChatGPT to improve their own work rather than asking it to create text from scratch. This trend reinforces the idea that users are not just looking to delegate a task, but to collaborate with AI to improve their own thinking and output, making writing a process of dialogue.
To conclude
When these five points are taken together, a clear picture emerges: the actual use of ChatGPT is much more personal, nuanced and collaborative than the prevailing discourse suggests. Far from being a simple productivity tool for a tech-savvy elite, it has become widely available as a personal thinking assistant. This predominance of personal use suggests that the well-being gains brought about by AI could be much greater than traditional economic analyses estimate.
While the data reveals a more personal and collaborative tool than expected, the real question is no longer whether AI will replace us, but how to integrate it to think better.
Article based on the document: A. Chatterji et al., How People use ChatGPT, NBER Working Paper No. 34255, Sept. 2025. Cover image generated by artificial intelligence for illustrative purposes.