OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has confirmed that the company will not go public in 2026, describing the current moment as an "ill-advised" time for an IPO given the safety challenges facing the AI industry.
In a 45-minute interview with Fortune, Altman covered a wide range of topics including the recent Hugging Face hacking incident, recursive self-improvement, and the possibility of building AI beyond human control. On the latter, he said it was "absolutely" possible but vowed to take actions to prevent it, even pausing training if necessary, adding that "there are risks we should not be able to incur on behalf of humanity."
"We're not rushing into an IPO. I actually think that, given everything happening with safety, this would be, right now would be an ill-advised moment to go public," Altman said. "And we don't feel pressure on that. We've said for a long time, we'll do it when we're ready. I would say not 2026. We've got a lot of stuff to do."
While OpenAI has filed confidentially for an IPO, Altman's comments suggest the company is prioritizing safety infrastructure and internal governance before subjecting itself to public market pressures. The statement comes amid intensifying debate about AI safety, including a researcher's resignation from Anthropic over concerns that leading companies are "gambling with our lives."
The decision signals that even as AI companies face investor pressure to monetize, the industry's leadership is increasingly framing safety as a prerequisite for scaling — not an afterthought.
