OpenAI’s Prism page now carries a banner: “Prism will shut down on January 1, 2027.” Prism is OpenAI’s AI writing and LaTeX workspace for scientific papers. OpenAI’s migration guide says all Prism data is deleted after the shutdown and cannot be recovered, so this is a hard deadline.
How to export
In Prism, open Settings, then Data Controls, then Export all projects (zip). Single projects can be exported from the project-title menu. OpenAI also suggests downloading the latest PDF of each important project as a reference. For a shared project you do not own, the export keeps the files but not your Prism chat history, so co-authors should each export what they own. If an export fails, check export-errors.json in the archive and retry.
What Codex does and does not replace
OpenAI is pointing users to Codex, which it says can read, edit and build an exported project in a local folder. The guide lists what does not carry over: the shared real-time editor, version history, inline comments, sharing permissions and the live Zotero link. Most multi-file projects also need a local TeX toolchain, such as TeX Live or MacTeX, to compile outside Prism. Groups that relied on Prism for co-writing will need another shared editor for that part.
Why this matters
Paper deadlines do not move for product shutdowns, and a 1 January shutdown lands right on many conference and grant cycles. It is also a reminder that AI writing tools are often experiments: Google is doing the same with Jules this week. Keeping source files in Git or a plain folder, even while you use a hosted editor, means a shutdown costs a weekend of setup rather than your drafts.
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