Sam Altman told Fortune that a 2026 listing would be ill-advised amid AI safety and alignment work, Reuters reported, and hinted the industry may be near a safety-pacing pact.
OpenAI will not go public in 2026, Chief Executive Sam Altman said in a Fortune interview published Saturday, citing AI safety and alignment priorities that make a listing “ill-advised” right now, Reuters reported.
“I actually think that, given everything happening with safety, right now would be an ill-advised moment to go public, and we don’t feel pressure on that,” Altman told Fortune, according to Reuters. Asked whether 2026 was off the table in favor of 2027, he said, “I would say not 2026,” adding that OpenAI has “a lot of stuff to do” on what safety and alignment will require and how industry and governments can work together.
On extinction risk, Altman said he did not know how a precise percentage could be calculated but that even figures in the low single digits to around 10% would be “unacceptable” as a tolerated outcome. Companies and governments, he said, should act so they are “not taking any of those numbers of risk.” Fortune also reported Altman suggesting OpenAI and other leading AI firms may be close to unveiling a pact to slow development and tackle safety risks together; he declined to pre-announce private talks but said he thinks that will happen.
The hard finance fact here is calendar: no OpenAI IPO in 2026. That is distinct from Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei’s separate “pace the frontier” plan already covered on AI Tech Daily. Reuters noted safety concerns have not slowed Anthropic’s own IPO timetable, with people familiar saying marketing could begin mid-October and a listing before the November midterms.
This brief covers Altman’s Fortune comments as reported by Reuters. It does not set a new OpenAI IPO date.