Free 3 min read

How to Check OpenAI API Status

Everything you need to know about monitoring OpenAI uptime — live status, incident history, email/webhook alerts, and programmatic checks.

OpenAI API — live status

Updated every 5 minutes. Click the badge or visit prismix.dev/service/openai for full incident history.

Full status →

Quick check: is the OpenAI API down right now?

The fastest way to check:

Prismix dashboard: prismix.dev/service/openai — live indicator + 30-day uptime + recent incidents in one place.
OpenAI's own page: status.openai.com — the authoritative source, but requires navigating to a separate site.
API call test: Hit https://prismix.dev/api/v1/statuses and check the openai object — indicator none means operational.

Step 1 — Set up free email alerts

Instead of manually checking, get an email the moment OpenAI's status changes. Takes 2 minutes:

1

Sign in

Go to prismix.dev/sign-in and enter your email (6-digit code, no password needed) or sign in with GitHub.
2

Star OpenAI

On prismix.dev/status or prismix.dev/service/openai, click the ☆ star icon next to OpenAI. Starred services trigger alerts.
3

You're done

Prismix detects every status change (operational → degraded → outage) and emails you within minutes. No configuration needed.

Pro users can also add Slack / Discord / custom webhooks and tune alert severity thresholds. See pricing →

Step 2 — Check programmatically

For CI pipelines, scripts, or dashboards — the free Prismix API returns OpenAI's status in JSON:

curl

curl https://prismix.dev/api/v1/statuses | jq '.services[] | select(.id=="openai")'

JavaScript / Node.js

const res = await fetch('https://prismix.dev/api/v1/statuses');
const { services } = await res.json();
const openai = services.find(s => s.id === 'openai');

if (openai.indicator !== 'none') {
  console.warn(`OpenAI is ${openai.indicator}: ${openai.description}`);
}

Python

import httpx

resp = httpx.get("https://prismix.dev/api/v1/statuses")
services = {s["id"]: s for s in resp.json()["services"]}
openai = services["openai"]

if openai["indicator"] != "none":
    print(f"OpenAI is {openai['indicator']}: {openai['description']}")

Full API docs: prismix.dev/api-docs. No auth required, 60-second edge cache.

What do OpenAI status indicators mean?

Indicator	Meaning	What to do
Operational	All OpenAI systems are working normally. API calls should succeed.	Nothing — you're good.
Degraded	Some API endpoints may be slow, returning errors for a subset of users, or a non-critical system is affected.	Implement retries with exponential backoff. Monitor for escalation.
Partial outage	Significant subset of users or API endpoints affected. Some calls will fail.	Pause non-critical batch jobs. Notify users if your product depends on OpenAI.
Major outage	Widespread failure — most API calls will fail. ChatGPT or the API may be completely down.	Activate fallback (e.g. local model, alternative provider). Check status.openai.com for incident updates.
Unknown	Prismix couldn't reach OpenAI's status page. May indicate a connectivity issue or the page itself is down.	Check status.openai.com directly.

Common causes of "OpenAI API not working"

If your API calls are failing but OpenAI's status page shows "Operational", the issue is usually on your end:

Rate limit exceeded — you're hitting your tier's RPM/TPM limit. 429 error with rate_limit_exceeded in the body. Implement exponential backoff and check your usage dashboard.
Invalid or expired API key — 401 Unauthorized. Regenerate your key at platform.openai.com/api-keys.
Quota exhausted — if your spend limit is reached, the API returns 429 with insufficient_quota. Check your billing limits.
Model deprecation — if you're calling a deprecated model ID, you'll get a 404 or model_not_found. Update to a supported model.
Geoblocking — OpenAI is not available in all countries. If you're proxying through a server in a restricted region, requests will be blocked.
Context window exceeded — input + output tokens exceed the model's context limit. Trim your prompt or switch to a model with a larger window.

If none of the above apply and the Prismix status shows "Operational", check the OpenAI incident history for any recent resolved issues that may still be affecting you.

🔔

Stop checking manually — get alerts instead

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