ChatGPT users have begun complaining that their memories with the chatbot are suddenly disappearing. Notably, the memory feature helps personalize the experience for users since ChatGPT remembers certain specific facts and preferences about the users across different chats.
"My ChatGPT was writing to memory a recipe, and after it was done, the entire 'saved memory' panel was blank, with no history at all. Everything is just gone. Has anyone else ever experienced that?" complained a user on Reddit's ChatGPT subreddit.
Other users on social media also chimed in, “I was so scared and shocked because I had like more than a year of memories there, a whole well-structured system.”
“Absolutely everything was wiped (including memory history so I can't restore). Devastated. Really hoping it randomly comes back,” added yet another user.
OpenAI also confirmed the issue in a status page: that there was an issue with the memory feature for ChatGPT, but the company says that it is now resolved. However, some users on social media are still facing issues with their ChatGPT memory.
Some users have said that just logging in and logging out of ChatGPT has worked to restore the old memories while the quick fix hasn't worked for many others.
If you are facing the disappearing memories issue, it would also be prudent to head over to the Personalization settings on ChatGPT and ensure that "Reference saved memories" and "Reference chat history" toggles are both turned on, which ensures that ChatGPT will save important information about you.
How to protect your ChatGPT Memories?
You can just head over to personalization settings on the ChatGPT app or website and take a manual backup of your ChatGPT memories. Here's how you can do so:
- Open the ChatGPT app or website.
- Head over to the profile section and click on "Personalization".
- Scroll down and find the "Memories" option.
- Click on "Manage memories".
- You should now see all the information that ChatGPT remembers about you.
- Copy all the information and paste it in a notepad or document.
- If you ever lose your memories again, you can simply re-add them.
Unfortunately, OpenAI doesn't currently provide an option to bulk import these memories by pasting them into the same manage memories field. What you can do instead is go to the chat field on ChatGPT and enter “Remember that…,” followed by each memory. It is a tedious process, but one that works to ensure that you get back the same ChatGPT behaviour that you liked.