Problem or Limitation:
ChatGPT data export ZIP files have grown substantially in size over time. In one case, the export increased from ~100MB to ~300MB within four months. The inclusion of media files (e.g., audio clips and images) significantly inflates the total export size, making downloads slower and storage management more difficult.
Feature Request:
Provide users with an option to exclude media files (ie images and audio) from ChatGPT data exports.
Proposed Behavior:
- Add a selectable option during the data export process to include or exclude media files.
- If media exclusion is selected, generate the export with only text-based conversation data and metadata.
- Clearly indicate estimated export size before finalizing the download.
- Default behavior remains unchanged (include all data) unless the user explicitly chooses to exclude media.
Context / Use Case:
After manually writing a script to remove media files from the exported ZIP, the total file size decreased by approximately 90%. Many users primarily need textual conversation history for backup, analysis, or archival purposes. Allowing media exclusion would significantly reduce storage requirements, download time, and bandwidth usage while preserving core conversational data.
Ver: 1.2026.041 (1771039076);
macOS Native App