Sora Shut Down: What Happened to Sora AI and Your Videos

Sora shut down in two steps. OpenAI discontinued the Sora web and app experiences on April 26, 2026, and the Sora API on September 24, 2026 ^[1]. If you made videos there, the one thing that still matters is your export: OpenAI says it permanently deletes Sora data once the service is gone and any final export window has passed. The wider lesson is bigger than one app. AI video tools retire models and features on a horizon of weeks to months, so treat every generator as temporary.

What happened to Sora AI, date by date

The news arrived on March 24, 2026, in a post from the official Sora account on X. Engadget reported that the post thanked everyone who had created with Sora and promised timelines later ^[2]. The dates came afterward. OpenAI's help article now lists two of them, and they are not the same. That gap is the first thing to understand about any shutdown notice.

The consumer side went first, 33 days after the announcement. The API kept running for roughly five more months. So when people ask whether Sora 2 shut down too, the honest answer depends on where they used it. In the app, it ended in April. Through the API, it ended in September. And Runway, which hosted Sora 2, pulled it even earlier than OpenAI did.

The apps built on top of Sora

Runway hosted Sora 2 and Sora 2 Pro as third-party models for paid plans, starting February 20, 2026. Runway removed both on April 3, 2026, weeks before OpenAI closed its own app; the list of Runway's current and retired models shows what replaced them. A Sora AI shutdown therefore reaches people who never opened Sora directly. If you generated through a reseller, the reseller's date is the one that counted for you.

Why did Sora AI shut down?

OpenAI's help article explains the dates, the export and the credits. It does not give a reason. The fullest on-record line came from an OpenAI spokesperson to Engadget: "We've decided to discontinue Sora in the consumer app and API. As we focus and compute demand grows, the Sora research team continues to focus on world simulation research to advance robotics that will help people solve real-world, physical tasks." That is a statement about priorities, not a detailed cause.

Engadget added context of its own. It cited data from analytics firm Appfigures that, at the start of 2026, suggested successive month-over-month declines in both new installs and user spending. It also reported, citing The Hollywood Reporter, that Disney was exiting the deal it had signed with OpenAI. 9to5Google noted that the announcement itself offered no explanation at all ^[3]. Anything beyond that is guesswork. Plan around the dates, not the theories.

What the Sora shut down means for your videos and credits

Three things changed for a Sora user, and each has its own rule. Your files, first. OpenAI says you can export content you created by going to sora.chatgpt.com/sunset and clicking Export; an email arrives when the archive is ready. If OpenAI offers a final export window, it says it will email you before that window begins. After discontinuation and that window, it permanently deletes the data.

Second, money. OpenAI points refund questions to its article on requesting a refund for a ChatGPT subscription. Third, leftover credits: OpenAI says purchased ChatGPT and Sora credits can still be used for Codex. That is useful if you code. It does nothing for a video workflow.

What you lose is harder to see. A video file is only the output. The prompt, the seed image, the settings and the edits that produced it lived inside Sora. If you never wrote them down, the archive gives you finished clips but no way to make the next one in the same style. That is why the export is step one, not the whole job.

Developers had a different problem. An app that called the Sora API kept working through the summer, until the API was discontinued on September 24, 2026. From then on, any feature built on it had to move to another model or go away. Teams that keep their prompts, their test clips and a note of which settings produced which result can rebuild against a new model far faster than teams that keep only the code. Our step-by-step backup guide covers keeping prompts and settings next to each file.

Sora is not the only case: AI video models retire in months

Sora is the loudest example, not the only one. Luma's Genie (text to 3D) and its Luma 3D Capture app have been sunset since January 1, 2026, per the App Store release note of Luma 3D Capture 1.3.14. Luma's Dream Machine evolved into Luma Agents in March 2026; it is still available to existing users, while new users start with Agents. The pattern repeats inside products that are very much alive.

Runway also retired Gen-3 Alpha and Gen-3 Alpha Turbo in mid-2026. In the Gemini app, Gemini Omni replaced Veo for video, while Flow kept Veo 3.1 Lite. Kling's upgrades are mapped in its model-by-model comparison.

The terms say the same thing in legal language. Higgsfield may remove any model at any time; if a paid feature is discontinued entirely, you may cancel for a pro-rata refund. Kling says a single feature can be withdrawn without compensation. Luma says it will try to give 30 days' notice before deprecating a material feature. Read those lines before you build a business on one model.

How to stay safe the next time a tool shuts down

You cannot stop a vendor from closing a product. You can make the closure small. The method is the same for an app, a model or a single feature.

1. Read the notice for every date. Separate the app date, the API date and any export window. Sora's were five months apart.
2. Export the day the notice lands. Do not wait for the final week, when servers are busy and emails get missed.
3. Keep the recipe with the result. Save the prompt, the start image, the model name and the settings beside each clip, in a sheet or a text file.
4. Download API outputs at once. Several tools expire generated file links fast: Runway's API links within 24 to 48 hours, Kling's MCP and CLI links after 24 hours.
5. Spend or settle leftover credits. Check where they can be used and how refunds work, as OpenAI spelled out for Sora.
6. Write prompts that move between models. Describe subject, action, camera and light in plain words, not one model's tricks.
7. Keep a second tool warm. One you have tried on a real job, so a shutdown costs you a week, not a month.

There is one more check. A model listed on a menu page is not proof that it runs. Months after OpenAI's dates, a few third-party pages still listed Sora 2. Try a generation before you plan a project around any model name.

Where to make AI videos now

People used Sora for text-to-video clips with sound, for animating images and for quick social clips. Several tools in our catalog cover those jobs, and each also retires models on its own schedule. If losing the recipe behind your clips is what stung, start with the one tool whose export keeps prompts and settings with the media.

If what you miss is typing a scene and getting picture and sound back, that habit has a near-direct home, and step 7 above, a second tool tried on a real job, can begin on a free account.

The third route answers the lesson of this whole page. A single model can vanish, as Sora 2 did from Runway's own menu, so a workspace that holds several labs' models side by side spreads that risk.

Our guide to Sora alternatives maps each Sora job to the tools that do it, with the trade-offs.

Two dates, one export window, and the next notice

April 26, 2026 for the web and app experiences, September 24, 2026 for the API: those two dates ended Sora. OpenAI's own article gives the export route and warns that the data is deleted afterward, so export now if you have not. OpenAI did not publish a reason; the press reported context, not a cause. Sora was not unusual. Every AI video tool retires models and features within months, so keep your files, your prompts and a second tool ready before the next notice.