- Who it helps
- People who want sensitive saved conversations out of view during screen sharing or shared-device use.
- Availability
- Rolling out on supported web, mobile and desktop clients. Detailed help lists personal and managed plans, subject to eligibility; Codex and local Work conversations cannot be locked.
What the lock changes
The feature changes visibility and access within the account. It does not create end-to-end encryption or change retention and model-improvement settings. Information remembered before locking can remain in regular memory, and an existing shared link must be removed separately to stop access to its previous content.
PIN recovery has a destructive consequence
OpenAI states that resetting a forgotten account PIN permanently deletes locked chats and content protected only by that PIN. Changing a known PIN is different. This makes understanding the recovery behavior part of the decision to use the feature.
What you can do
- Read the eligibility and PIN-reset sections before locking a conversation. Open reference ↗
Where the evidence stops
Help pages checked October 22; no chat or setting was changed. Documentation establishes the stated behavior, not an independent security evaluation.
Sources read. Sources checked October 22, 2026 UTC. No external software workflow, model inference or reported experiment was executed.
Sources & further reading
Web · official
Using locked chats in ChatGPT ↗
Read eligibility, retention, sharing, memory and PIN-reset limits. No chat was locked or changed during this research.
OpenAI · page checked 2026-10-22
Web · official
ChatGPT: October 20 locked-chats release note ↗
Read the dated October 20 announcement and followed its detailed help article. The rollout note names personal plans; detailed help includes additional plans subject to rollout.
OpenAI · page checked 2026-10-22 · Published 2026-10-20
More sources reviewed (1)
Web · analysis
TLDR AI: October 21 editorial comparison ↗
Read all sixteen nonsponsored editorial items in the native browser after main discovery. Ads and the job listing were excluded. Digest claims were followed to primary sources where available.
TLDR · page checked 2026-10-22 · Published 2026-10-21
Coverage note: The linked primary evidence was inspected. Independent execution and a complete cross-platform discussion sample are missing; no original X source was verified.
The record over time (1)
Dated source checks and published explanations. An observation date can differ from the original release date.
- · Added to Current
ChatGPT introduced locked chats on October 20. Eligible saved conversations can be hidden from ordinary history and search, then opened with an account PIN or supported device authentication.