So the data is still there we just can access it? So if the feature gets restored does that mean we’ll get our old edits back?
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To the **OpenAI team / support**: totally understand fixes can take time (I’m fine with 5–7 working days). The frustration is the communication gap—after asking for details and getting many replies, it would really help to have a simple acknowledgement like “noted, we’re working on it, we’ll update when we have a fix/rollback,” even without an ETA. Right now it feels like the thread goes quiet after collecting info, which makes it hard to plan workflows—especially since this is retroactive and affects older chats too.
To everyone facing this too: just sharing what I’m seeing from my side, because a lot of us are stuck in the same situation. There are strong signs the **version tree/older variants are still in the record** (for example, older text can still show up in search, but we can’t navigate to it), and OpenAI support has also said that **on their side they can see the message count + arrows and access edited message history**—so this looks much more like a **UI/flag regression bug** than content being wiped. That said, fixes can take time—this isn’t the first time. In **2025** there was a similar issue where the **edit pencil disappeared** and the response selector showed weird counts like **0×2 / 0×3**, so you couldn’t actually switch versions even though the UI existed, and it took roughly **3–4 weeks** to fully come back for everyone.
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I’m just another user like you, so I don’t know whether everything will ultimately be restored.
From what I can see, the conversation structure still appears to exist on the backend and doesn’t seem to be deleted.
However, until there’s an official response, we can’t be 100% certain.
I really value ChatGPT and hope we can get some clarification soon.
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Honestly your response gave me more comfort that anything support has said so far lol, thanks <3
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God bless you this makes SO much sense. No shade to the devs, but your explanation is much clearer than what they’ve shared (which is basically nothing so far) because now I can conceptualize why this is happening.
After skimming some of the Statsig docs (massive speculation incoming) I wonder if the devs rolled out an experiment with the random unit MAYBE being our user id’s, which would explain why things like clearing cache or using a different browser doesn’t fix it (source: I tried it myself), and why this seems to be account specific.
My guess: They may be testing a new way to navigate chat history (maybe assumed that pagination is outdated), which would explain the hide_pagination experiment flag. But if this new thing is failing to load due to its own bug or a logic error when it interacts with other features, that would explain why we poor souls in the experiment group only get hide_pagination enabled, but no way to actually see our past conversations.
So it could very well be that the old way is hidden but the new way is broken. That would explain why the convo data is still there—we just don’t have a way to access it. I’m only spitballing though; I just learned what Statsig was like 20 minutes ago 
Just the ramblings of a new programming major who has a very basic grasp on coding lol
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Could we please get an update on this? It’s been four days now and the issue is still ongoing.
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This feature was a huge advantage. If it goes away I will be cancelling my subscription and moving to claude.
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Could we please get an actual update now — or at least a clear confirmation of what is going on?
Is this an intentional change, a bug, or an experiment?
Right now there has been no meaningful follow-up, and the lack of communication is honestly making this worse.
I’m cancelling my subscription until there is at least some clarity, and I’m sure I’m not the only one.
This feature is a bare minimum requirement for anyone doing iterative work and relying on feedback/revisions.
If this feature was intentionally removed, then that should have been announced clearly in advance so users could save important content.
Instead, people are now finding out after the fact, when their previous versions are no longer accessible.
I have personally lost a lot of important material because of this.
That is not a minor inconvenience — it directly breaks real workflows.
Also, competing products still offer this functionality, so removing it (or breaking it without communication) puts ChatGPT at a serious disadvantage for professional use.
And if this is/was part of an experiment, users should be able to choose whether they want to be part of it — especially when the experiment affects access to revision history and previously created content.
At this point, the silence in this thread is extremely frustrating.
Please provide a clear status update.
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@OpenAI_Support It’s been 6 days. Are we really not going to get an update on this? I don’t think we’re asking for much.
This is such a severe lack of communication, and the fact that support is actively replying to other threads is very telling. I don’t think I’ll continue my subscription without this feature, or at least some proper communication.
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This is a core feature for business use, it’s completely useless to not be able to iterate your prompts and return to potentially better options. Please respond to what is happening?!?!
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What does it tell us that they actively respond to other threads? Because when I lost the feature on my own free account, and I realized a friend of mine with paid subscription still had it, I leaped to the conclusion that ChatGPT was actually doing something so scummy as relocating an essential function behind a paywall to force free users to “pay for the privilege” of using a basic AI chat feature to motivate those of us who can’t afford the additional cost on top of everything else to leave the platform. When I found this thread, however, I heard that the opposite were also true: Some people with paid subscriptions have lost the feature, and some free users retains it.
So I think that this refutes my initial theory - thankfully. But what would you say the implications of poor communications are? I assumed they’re trying to diagnose the problem and waiting with the update or any false hope until they know more for certain, but I could be wrong.
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Hi everyone,
since there hasn’t been any official update from OpenAI, I figured I’d share what I’ve been able to find out. I contacted OpenAI Support on Tuesday - over email, because the AI support wasn’t getting me anywhere.
It took some back and forth to get past the standard troubleshooting steps and to make clear that this is not a local issue. I sent them a screen recording and was later asked to provide a link to an affected chat as well as a HAR file. I also mentioned what @alantsaichunan said about the “hide_pagination” flag and the possibility that this issue is tied to an experiment.
I received a reply about two hours ago. Support acknowledged the problem and told me that the issue “will need to be escalated to our specialist team.” They said it’s now under review and that the specialist team may follow up, though it could take a couple of days. But they did assure me that it will be reviewed.
I can’t guarantee anything. I’m just relaying what I was told by support. But I hope this gives everyone at least some clarity.
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Interesting use of rhetoric on there part. “Reviewed” rather than “fixed” or that adjacent. That only holds them to the standard of “We’ll look at it!” and nothing further. I have lost any and all trust I once had for this company.
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Hi everyone,
I m experiencing the same issue with the missing message version arrows. Luckily i found a workaround i wanted to share with everyone:
While currently the UI no longer shows message version arrows or allows navigating edited message history, the full conversation structure — including threaded branches — is still returned by the backend.
You can access it via browser DevTools:
- Open the ChatGPT conversation.
- Open DevTools (F12 or Right Click → Inspect).
- Go to the Network tab.
- Enable Preserve log.
- Enable Disable cache (important to prevent missing the request).
- Use the filter and select Fetch/XHR to reduce noise.
- Reload the page.
- Look for a network request whose name matches the conversation ID.
- Click it.
- In the right panel, open the Preview or Response tab.
The JSON payload includes:
- All messages
- Parent/child relationships
- Edited versions
- Threaded branches
So while the UI no longer exposes version navigation, the underlying conversation threaded tree remains available in the response payload.
This may help recover edited or branched content until an official fix is implemented.
Watch them patch this workaround out soon. It’s clear they’re trying to limit free users as much as possible for obvious reason, and they simply haven’t yet tested it enough to outright say it.
Any chance you could mail them back and give the polite version of the: “…. And when you review it and actually diagnose the problem, you’ll fix it. Right?”. ?
I have a secondary Plus account (perhaps not a predicament in which most people in this thread find themselves, but it grants me a great opportunity to compare and contrast) and the navigation arrows have stayed visible and available the whole time. So this appears to me not to be related to “free versus paid” so much as what was suggested by another poster, i.e. some experimental feature gone wrong.
It’s quietly hilarious to think about; OpenAI, darling of the computer industry, showcasing agile development and a “Canary” deployment / Feature flag rollout strategy … and then, when it turns out they shipped a turd, they adhere to the tried and tested methodology of “do nothing”.
– How’s that fancy Japanese toilet of yours working out, Bob?
– Oh it’s incredible, really expensive and very modern, Joe, so very modern. But, uh…
– Yeah?
– Well, the turds still won’t flush.