ChatGPT plans and prices in three markets, November 2026| Plan | United States | United Kingdom | Canada |
|---|
| Free | $0 | £0 | CA$0 |
| Go | $8 a month | About £7.20 inc VAT | About CA$11 |
| Plus | $20 a month | About £19.20 inc VAT | About CA$25 to CA$28 |
| Business Standard | $25 per seat monthly, $20 annual | About £22.50 per seat inc VAT | Billed as CAD equivalent |
Which chatgpt free for students offer is still open in November 2026?
Two routes remain live and one is closed, and the closed one is the biggest.
The four-month Plus offer is closed. OpenAI's Help Center states the claim window ended October 31, 2026, after giving eligible US students four free monthly billing periods that renewed at $20 unless cancelled.
What still works is the Codex credit route. OpenAI provides $100 in Codex credits to verified university students in the United States and Canada, aimed at coding work rather than chat use. That chatgpt free for students perk is live as of November 2026.
The original promo set the pattern: two free months of Plus ran from March 31 to May 31, 2025 for US and Canadian post-secondary students. It was never renewed as written, but the 2026 edition proves similar offers return around exam seasons.
Watching for the next chatgpt free for students offer is a one-page job. Bookmark the OpenAI Help Center students page and check it again around finals and spring exams, which is when both of the previous promos opened.
Student offers under ChatGPT, status November 2026| Offer | Who qualified | What you got | Status now |
|---|
| Back to School 2026 | College and graduate students at US degree-granting institutions | Four free billing periods of Plus, renewing at $20 | Closed, claim deadline October 31, 2026 |
| Spring 2025 promo | US and Canadian post-secondary students | Two free months of Plus | Ended May 31, 2025 |
| Codex credits | Verified university students, US and Canada | $100 in Codex credits | Open, November 2026 |
| ChatGPT Edu | Students at participating campuses | Plus-level access through the school account, free at use | Open while your university licenses it |
What mistakes cost students money at renewal?
The classic loss is the silent upgrade. A claimed promo converts into a paid subscription unless you cancel, and OpenAI says offers cannot be moved to another account once activated. Put the renewal date in your calendar the same day you claim anything.
Three constraints catch claimers. Subscriptions billed through the Apple App Store or Google Play cannot hold the offer while they stay store-billed. A valid payment method is required even during the free months, and the allocation is once per account.
Treat every promo as its own terms sheet too. Claim windows, renewal prices and eligibility gates have all differed between years, so read the offer page the day you claim it rather than relying on memory from the last cycle.
How do you verify enrollment and claim an offer?
Verification runs through SheerID. You enter your institution, and SheerID either confirms enrollment against trusted records or sends you through a school sign-in and a document check.
Attach the offer to the account you actually use, not a throwaway created for the promo. The verification and the subscription live on the same account, and support cannot transfer a claimed offer afterward.
If you claimed during orientation week and forgot about it, check your billing page today. SheerID eligibility follows the institution list rather than your student card, so a school with extension campuses can fail the check.
Canada fights the scope trap as well. The 2026 Back to School offer was US-only, while the 2025 promo covered both countries, so verify the region list on the current offer page before counting on it.
When does paying make sense for a student?
Three situations justify money. Exam season, when the free cap becomes a wall several times a day, and a thesis or capstone with a long research phase, where Plus levels and Work features earn the $20. The third is coding coursework, where the Codex path works better on paid tiers.
Campus access beats everything, in order. If your university runs ChatGPT Edu, use it before spending your own money, and treat a personal subscription as the fallback for the summer months when school access lapses.
If money is tight, Go at $8 is the honest middle: more volume than Free, less than half the price of Plus. Students in the UK should budget against the VAT-inclusive checkout figure rather than a converted dollar amount.
How does free ChatGPT compare with Claude and Gemini for students?
Gemini currently owns the strongest deal: a full free year of an AI plan for students, with US students getting Google AI Pro and others getting Google AI Plus, redeemable until December 31, 2026. Our Gemini free for students guide walks the three-country table.
Claude has no public student discount at all. Its free plan is open to everyone, and richer free access arrives through a university's Claude for Education license, which we cover in the Claude free for students guide.
The practical stack for 2026 is simple. Claim the Gemini year first, run everyday coursework on free ChatGPT, and add the Codex credits if you write code.
Students who build real fluency with these tools are also turning it into paid side work, which the remote AI prompt evaluator guide breaks down by the hour.
One detail worth considering is a stacked setup. A free year of Gemini alongside free ChatGPT covers research, drafting and slides without a single subscription, and Claude's free tier fills in long-document review when its limits allow it.
If your campus collects coursework with AI in the loop, know where student text ends up. The data annotation side of AI explains the downstream market for exactly that material.
Next steps for students on a free account
Create the account, try Study Mode on your hardest course, and ask the library or IT desk whether your campus already runs ChatGPT Edu.
If it does, you get Plus-level access with data protections and pay nothing. If it does not and you write code, claim the $100 Codex credits while the window is open.
Then watch the Help Center heading into exam season. Three consecutive years of student promos makes a successor a reasonable expectation, not a rumor.
Photo: JESHOOTS-com, Pixabay Content License, via Pixabay (https://pixabay.com/photos/laptop-woman-education-study-young-3087585/)
Fazlur Rahman
