ChatGPT Atlas Is Shutting Down: How to Switch to Phi Browser

OpenAI is retiring ChatGPT Atlas less than a year after its launch. According to OpenAI's official migration notice, Atlas is scheduled to stop working on August 9, 2026. After that date, the app may no longer open, browse, or support agentic workflows.

This is not simply a pause in feature development. OpenAI says Atlas is being deprecated and advises users to move to a supported browser experience before the deadline because browsers require continuing security maintenance.

OpenAI is not abandoning agentic browsing. It is moving what it learned from Atlas into ChatGPT and Codex, including a more capable browser inside the ChatGPT desktop app and browser assistance through Chrome. If that consolidated ChatGPT experience is what you want, it is the official migration path.

But Atlas also proved that some people want something more specific: not an AI app that contains a browser, but a proper browser in which AI understands the work already happening across tabs. If that is what you came to Atlas for, Phi Browser is worth considering.

First, save your data. The deadline is a rather unforgiving browser feature.

Before you switch: save your Atlas data

OpenAI is giving users roughly 30 days to move. Atlas browser data will not automatically follow you into another browser, so do this before experimenting with replacements.

To export bookmarks, open Atlas's bookmark manager, choose its export option, and save the resulting .html file somewhere you can find again. OpenAI's notice provides the current step-by-step instructions.

Do not email cookie or session files to yourself, place them in a shared folder, or upload them to a random conversion tool. Anyone who can use a valid session file may be able to act as you on the corresponding service. A browser migration is an inconvenient time to donate your accounts to the internet.

The migration path from Atlas to Phi

Atlas exports bookmarks in the standard HTML format, and Phi can import that file directly. You do not need to install Chrome or use another browser as a bridge.

The path is simply:

Atlas → bookmarks HTML → Phi

This transfers bookmarks and bookmark folders. It does not transfer Atlas history, passwords, cookies, active sessions, extensions, or any open tab you did not save as a bookmark.

1. Export from Atlas

   Export your Atlas bookmarks as HTML. Before exporting, turn any open tabs you cannot afford to lose into bookmarks so that they are included in the file. Save a separate URL list as a backup if the tabs are especially important.

2. Install Phi Browser

   Download Phi for Mac, open the .dmg, and drag Phi into Applications. Phi currently requires an Apple Silicon Mac and macOS 14 or newer. Homebrew users can instead run:

   Bash

   brew install --cask phibrowser/tap/phi

3. Import the HTML file into Phi

   Open a regular Phi Space and start Import Bookmarks and Settings. Choose the bookmark HTML option, select the .html file exported from Atlas, and confirm the import.

   Bookmarks are scoped to the Phi Space receiving the import. Choose or create the Space where you want the recovered Atlas bookmarks to live before selecting the file.

4. Verify before removing Atlas

   Open several imported folders and links in Phi. Check the count and nesting against the Atlas export, confirm that your most important pages are present, and keep the original HTML file as a backup.

   Only uninstall Atlas after you have verified the result. History, unsaved open tabs, passwords, cookies, and active sessions do not come across through this route, so plan to sign in again and reinstall any extensions you still need.

Why Phi will feel familiar to an Atlas user

Atlas users are not leaving an ordinary browser. They are leaving a browser built around three expectations: the assistant should understand the page, it should be able to act, and it should remember enough context that every task does not begin from zero.

Phi starts from the same expectations, but makes different product choices around the browser itself, long-running work, and where personal context lives.

It is a browser first

Phi is a Chromium-based browser with a native macOS interface built in AppKit and SwiftUI. That means familiar web compatibility and extension support underneath an interface designed specifically for the Mac.

You can begin in Comfortable Mode, with tabs on top and a visible address bar, then move to Balanced Mode for a sidebar plus address bar or Performance Mode for a sidebar-first layout. You do not need to relearn browsing and AI at the same time. Civilization has suffered enough onboarding already.

The assistant understands more than one page

Opening Phi's assistant attaches the current tab by default. You can also attach multiple tabs, a whole Tab Group, or a Split View and ask across the pages together: compare products, summarize research, extract differences, or turn several references into one answer.

This is the part Atlas users tend to miss immediately in a conventional browser. The page is not something you copy into a separate chatbot. It is already part of the conversation.

The agent can work now, later, or repeatedly

Phi divides browser automation into three clear modes:

• On-demand actions happen in the browser while you watch.
• Shadow Tasks run in the background after you explicitly ask for background execution, so you can keep browsing or close the conversation.
• Scheduled tasks repeat on a schedule, such as monitoring a product price or watching a page for changes. Phi Sentinel keeps this work moving when no browser window is open.

Consequential steps pause for confirmation, and background tasks can be cancelled or rerun. Results and files are available from Phi Sentinel's Scheduled Tasks page, with optional phone notifications through Phi Link.

Memory stays visible and manageable

Phi Memory learns useful context from what you browse, not only from what you remember to type into a chat. That context is stored locally on your Mac, and you can view, manage, delete, import, or export it. You can also stop Memory from learning on specific sites.

The distinction matters. A personal assistant becomes more useful as it understands recurring projects, interests, and habits. It should not require that understanding to become an opaque account asset you cannot inspect or take with you.

Phi is local-first, not local-only. Private AI can run Memory and data-search work on your Mac, and Phi can connect to Ollama, LM Studio, or another OpenAI-compatible endpoint. Chat and web tasks may still use Phi Cloud unless you provide a sufficiently capable alternative. The privacy guide and Private AI guide explain the current boundary.

Spaces keep browser context organized

Atlas offered a straightforward tab strip and an AI sidebar. Phi adds a deeper workspace model for people whose browser contains several lives at once.

A Space is the visible workspace: its tabs, bookmarks, name, icon, and color. A Profile is the isolation layer beneath it: cookies, history, logins, and extensions. Several Spaces can share one Profile, or each can use a different Profile when accounts must stay separate.

URL Rules can send a site to the right Space automatically. Split View keeps two pages side by side, while Tab Groups collect the pages belonging to one project. The assistant understands both structures as context rather than treating them as decoration.

Skills make repeated workflows reusable

Phi Skills turn a repeatable process into something the assistant can invoke again. Built-in Skills are reviewed and opt-in, while your own Skills can capture instructions, output formats, and routines in plain language. Phi builds on the open SKILL.md model and applies runtime boundaries to trusted browser execution rather than allowing a model to improvise arbitrary code inside a signed-in tab.

For users who want selected ChatGPT conversations inside Phi, an opt-in built-in Export ChatGPT Conversation Skill can import the currently open chatgpt.com conversation into Phi's Chats list, one conversation per run. This is optional: OpenAI says your ChatGPT conversation history is separate from Atlas and is not being deleted as part of the browser shutdown.

Atlas and Phi at a glance

Switch before the deadline, not after it

Atlas is scheduled to stop working on August 9, 2026. Before then:

1. Export your bookmarks as HTML.
2. Save important open tabs and history pages.
3. Keep cookie and session files private.
4. Import the bookmark HTML directly into Phi.
5. Verify the result before uninstalling Atlas.

Then use Phi as a browser first. Pick a layout, open the pages you use every day, create a Work and Personal Space if you need them, and ask the assistant about the page already in front of you. Add Memory, Private AI, and scheduled work when you are ready rather than configuring everything on the first afternoon.

Atlas showed that an assistant belongs beside the work happening on the web. Phi carries that idea forward as a browser built to remain a browser: native on the Mac, compatible with the web, open to inspection, and increasingly capable of working alongside you.

Download Phi Browser for Mac and move your Atlas bookmarks before August 9. For the full product walkthrough, continue with the Phi getting-started guide.