This map shows which states are paying for OpenAI vs Anthropic — and there's a clear winner

• Spending on OpenAI was higher than on Anthropic in 47 states, according to YipitData.
• Anthropic led in only Massachusetts, Montana, and California.
• The map is a warning sign for Anthropic — though it's not a perfect proxy for consumer sentiment.

OpenAI and Anthropic are duking it out. One company dominates state-by-state spending.

YipitData collected AI spending data from consumer credit and debit cards between June and August. The data, which Andreessen Horowitz first published Monday in its "Top 100 Gen AI Consumer Apps" report, shows OpenAI with a major lead.

People spent more on OpenAI products than on Anthropic's in 47 states, Yipit found. The only states where Claude led in spending were Massachusetts, Montana, and California.

Anthropic also led OpenAI spending in Washington, DC.

OpenAI owned at least 70% of spending in eight states. Delaware leaned hard for OpenAI at 82%; the other states to reach that threshold were Alaska (74%), Kentucky (71%), Louisiana (71%), Mississippi (77%), North Dakota (71%), New Mexico (70%), and West Virginia (72%).

The map isn't a perfect proxy for consumer AI preferences. In measuring spending, the map excludes free users of ChatGPT and Claude. It's also a state-by-state comparison, something that can be tricky when population levels differ so broadly. Indeed, the biggest state by population (California) swung toward the losing company (Anthropic).

The map also doesn't include other, more consumer-facing AI companies. Meta has recently been scoring big with customers through its AI agent, Muse. Many everyday tech users interact with Gemini, thanks to its native integration in Google products.

Still, the map is one signal that ChatGPT still reigns supreme. It was the first player in the chatbot race, and the name many still associate with AI.

ChatGPT and Claude have their differences. Two 2025 studies found that ChatGPT is better suited to augmentation, while Claude is better suited to automation. ChatGPT is also the only of the two chatbots with image-generation capabilities.

Still, ChatGPT may not be OpenAI's most important product. That crown goes to Codex, the company's AI coding tool.