ChatGPT 5.6 Sol is failing again in September 21, users report
Paid ChatGPT users say GPT-5.6 Sol is behaving differently again on September 21, 2026. According to reports shared in the OpenAI Developer Community, some subscribers who select High or Max reasoning receive replies within seconds instead of the longer responses they previously associated with deep reasoning workflows.
OpenAI’s public status page shows ChatGPT as operational. However, users participating in community discussions say their experience does not match what they expect from the selected reasoning mode.
What users reported about GPT-5.6 Sol reasoning problems
On September 3, 2026, community member zolescosolutions created the discussion thread titled “GPT-5.6 Sol High Reasoning Appears Broken — Instant Replies, No Deep Thinking, File Workflows Failing.” Users in the discussion described problems with file analysis, debugging tasks and multi-step workflows.
Reported symptoms include:
- Instant answers after selecting High, Extra High or Max reasoning.
- No visible signs of extended reasoning according to users.
- Uploaded files not being used during conversations.
- Long workflows ending with shorter or generic responses.
- Answers that users describe as similar to smaller models.
Users say the model selector shows Sol but responses feel different
Subscribers say this does not look like a complete outage. They report that the interface still displays GPT-5.6 Sol, but they notice changes in response speed, depth and workflow reliability.
Some users compare recent responses with previous tests using the same files and prompts. They report that tasks that previously took several minutes now complete much faster, but with results they consider less useful.
Community members connect the reports with previous model routing complaints
Some users say similar reports appeared in previous months, describing situations where selecting a reasoning model appeared to produce responses closer to faster models. These claims come from community members and have not been independently confirmed by OpenAI.
The reports have focused mainly on Chat conversations. Some users say other product areas continue to behave differently, including workflows where additional processing or tools are involved.
What is confirmed and what remains user speculation
The confirmed information is that users have published complaints describing changes in GPT-5.6 Sol behavior and that OpenAI’s status page does not currently indicate a broad service outage.
Claims about silent model switching, reduced reasoning capacity or resource allocation between subscription tiers remain user interpretations and have not been confirmed by OpenAI.
The discussion continues as users compare response times, file handling and reasoning behavior across different ChatGPT experiences.
