Politeness is free—or is it? In the world of AI, where millions of queries are processed daily, every word counts—literally. Recently, a surprising claim made waves across social media: saying “please” and “thank you” to chatbots like ChatGPT might be costing companies millions of dollars in electricity and increasing carbon emissions.
As AI becomes a daily companion for writing, research, and casual conversation, people naturally apply human social rules to their digital interactions. But behind those friendly exchanges, powerful data centers are running at full throttle. Could our kindness be harming the planet?
In this article, we dive into the hidden energy costs of polite AI prompts, explore whether the environmental impact is significant, and discuss what this means for the future of our digital etiquette.
How AI Like ChatGPT Processes Language
Before we talk about the energy behind polite prompts, let’s understand what happens when you type a sentence into an AI like ChatGPT.
At its core, ChatGPT operates on a transformer model trained on billions of words. When you enter a prompt, it’s broken down into smaller units called tokens. A token could be a word, part of a word, or punctuation. For instance, the sentence “Hello, how are you?” contains six tokens.
Each token is processed through a complex network of computations to generate a coherent response. These computations occur in massive data centers filled with high-performance servers that require substantial electricity to operate and cool.
This means that longer prompts—especially those padded with polite niceties—require more processing power than shorter, direct ones.
The Hidden Cost of Politeness
Let’s look at a typical example:
Prompt A:
“What is the capital of Kenya?”
Prompt B:
“Hi there! I hope you’re having a great day. Could you please tell me what the capital of Kenya is? Thank you so much!”
Prompt B contains more than twice the number of tokens as Prompt A. Now, imagine that instead of one user, millions are sending verbose and polite prompts every day. The effect compounds significantly.
According to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, these extra tokens cost the company “tens of millions of dollars annually.” Why? Because even a few additional words multiply across the platform’s vast user base, leading to an enormous increase in computing demand—and electricity.
Politeness, in this context, isn’t just a social gesture; it’s an energy expense.
What the Experts Say
OpenAI isn’t the only one highlighting this issue. Tech experts and analysts are beginning to examine the “token inflation” caused by human-like conversations with AI.
A report by Tom’s Hardware pointed out that extra polite language adds significant processing strain on AI systems. Although each individual interaction has a negligible effect, the global volume of interactions creates a notable increase in both cost and carbon emissions.
Yet, researchers also caution against overblowing the issue. The incremental cost and energy usage of a few extra tokens are small when compared to the environmental impact of other digital activities—like video streaming or Bitcoin mining.
Still, it’s a factor worth considering as AI becomes more integrated into our daily routines.
How Serious Is the Impact?
To put things into perspective, let’s talk numbers.
Each AI prompt consumes a small amount of electricity—roughly equivalent to charging a smartphone for a few minutes. However, when scaled to billions of daily interactions, that energy use starts to resemble the footprint of a small nation.
Even though “please” and “thank you” are only a few extra words, they multiply into millions of kilowatt-hours of extra computation over time. In environmental terms, this could equal several thousand tons of carbon dioxide annually.
However, it’s worth remembering that AI infrastructure is continually being optimized for energy efficiency. Some companies are even investing in renewable-powered data centers to offset their carbon footprint.
So, is your single polite prompt destroying the Earth? No. But in the context of mass usage, it contributes to a bigger picture worth addressing.
Why Politeness Still Matters
Now that we know polite prompts consume more energy, should we stop saying “please” and “thank you” to AI?
Not necessarily.
There’s a growing school of thought that encourages treating AI as if it were human—not because it has feelings, but because we do.
Politeness helps foster empathy, emotional connection, and civility in digital spaces. Teaching children to say “please” to Alexa or ChatGPT reinforces social norms that are valuable in real life.
Interestingly, some studies have found that polite prompts actually yield better responses from AI. Phrases like “Could you kindly explain…” or “Would you mind summarizing…” may trigger more context-aware and comprehensive replies, likely due to the model being trained on human conversational patterns.
So, while there’s a small cost, there’s also a psychological and functional benefit.
Finding the Balance
So, what’s the verdict? Should we trim our prompts or keep being polite?
Here’s a balanced approach:
When to keep it simple:
- If you’re running quick queries or batch-processing multiple prompts
- When you’re working on tasks that require speed and efficiency
- If you’re concerned about minimizing your digital carbon footprint
When it’s okay to be polite:
- If you’re using AI casually or for fun
- When you’re teaching kids how to interact with technology
- If the emotional tone of your interaction matters
Tips:
- Avoid redundancy: Say “please” once, not three times.
- Combine warmth with brevity: “Hi, could you help me with this?” is enough.
- Stay human, but conscious. A polite sentence doesn’t need to be a whole paragraph.
Conclusion
The idea that saying “please” and “thank you” to AI costs electricity—and therefore money and carbon—isn’t a myth. It’s a real, though relatively minor, effect of our increasingly conversational tech culture.
While the environmental impact of polite AI prompts is not catastrophic, it’s a unique example of how human habits intersect with modern technology in unexpected ways.
Politeness may not be “free” anymore in the digital world, but that doesn’t mean we should stop being kind. Instead, we can be both thoughtful and efficient—acknowledging the cost without abandoning the warmth that makes technology more human-friendly.
So go ahead and thank your chatbot—it might use a little extra electricity, but the kindness behind it still goes a long way.