Memory
A private database about you, quietly prepended to every conversation.
Every chat normally starts from an empty window and is wiped when you leave. Memory is the exception: ChatGPT can save little facts about you into a separate memory bank that is prepended to all future conversations. Let it run and it gradually gets to know you — and its answers (movie picks, especially) get more relevant. Sometimes it saves automatically; often you just ask it to remember.
He tells ChatGPT his (strong) opinion about the “peak” era of Hollywood, agrees with its take, then asks it to remember — and a “Memory updated” banner appears.
“ChatGPT wrote a little summary of what it learned about me as a person and recorded this text in its memory bank… a database of knowledge about you, always prepended to all the conversations so that the model has access to it.”
Andrej Karpathy·1:50:20
If it doesn't save automatically, say “please remember this.” You can also view, edit, add, and delete memories in settings — it's just a list of text strings. Karpathy finds it makes ChatGPT's movie recommendations noticeably better over time.
As of filming, memory is largely unique to ChatGPT. It's a quality-of-life layer on top of the zip file — not new intelligence, just persistent context that saves you re-explaining yourself.
The load-bearing points
- Memory = a personal text database prepended to every chat.
- Saved automatically sometimes; otherwise just ask it to remember.
- You can view / edit / delete memories.
- It makes answers more personal over time (e.g. recommendations).
Teach it one thing
Tell ChatGPT a durable preference and say “remember this.” Start a fresh chat and see if it acts on it.
Show the point
That persistence across a wiped window is the whole feature — context that survives “new chat.”
Audit your memories
Open the memory manager and read what it has saved. Delete anything stale or wrong.
Show the point
It's just a list of strings you fully control — worth a periodic clean-up.
Automatically (the model decides something is worth keeping) or explicitly (you say “remember this”). Either way you can later view and edit the list.