"How do I embed ChatGPT on my website" is one of the most common questions people ask about AI chatbots, and the literal answer is no. ChatGPT is OpenAI's own product, with its own interface and its own account system. You cannot drop it into your page any more than you can embed someone else's mobile app.
But that is not really what anyone is asking. They want a chat box on their site that answers questions the way ChatGPT does, ideally about their own business. That is very achievable, and there are three honest ways to do it.
What people actually mean
When someone says "ChatGPT on my website", they usually mean one of three things:
- A general assistant on the site that can chat about anything
- A chatbot that answers questions about their products, policies, and content
- A support widget that behaves like a knowledgeable human
The first is rarely what a business needs; a visitor who wants to talk about anything already has ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini open in another tab. The second and third are the same thing: a chatbot grounded in your content. Almost every "embed ChatGPT" search resolves to that.
Option 1: Build on a model API yourself
OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google all sell API access to the models behind ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini. You can build a chat widget that sends each visitor's message to one of them and shows the reply.
What that involves in practice:
- A backend that holds your API key, because the key can never sit in a public page
- Retrieval, so the model answers from your content instead of from general knowledge
- Guardrails, so it declines off-topic requests and does not invent policies
- A widget, with the loading, error, and mobile behaviour handled
- Ongoing cost per message, plus the engineering time to keep all of the above working
This is the right choice if the chatbot is your product. For a website that needs its FAQ answered, it is a month of work to reach where a hosted tool starts.
Option 2: Use OpenAI's own sharing features
Custom GPTs can be shared by link, and some OpenAI plans offer ways to publish them. What you get is a link to a ChatGPT experience, not a widget in your page, and your visitors need their own ChatGPT account to use it. That works for a community or a course; it does not work as a support widget for anonymous visitors.
Option 3: A hosted chatbot trained on your content
This is what most people land on. You upload documents, add website pages, or paste YouTube links; the platform indexes them; a widget on your site answers visitors' questions from that content and says when something is not covered.
That is exactly what Cortexvia does. The relevant properties:
- Grounded answers. The chatbot answers from your sources, not from the open internet, which is the behaviour you want on a shipping policy or a syllabus.
- One embed snippet. Two CDN files and a mount call, pasted before the closing body tag. No backend to run and no key in your page. The platform guides show where it goes on WordPress, Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, React, Next.js, and plain HTML.
- A handoff. When the answer is not in your content, the visitor gets your email or contact page rather than a guess.
- Flat pricing. Plans in your local currency with a daily message allowance, a free plan to start, and no per-conversation fees.
What about the model underneath?
People often ask whether a hosted chatbot "uses ChatGPT". The honest answer is that the model matters less than the grounding. A very capable model answering from general knowledge will confidently describe a returns policy you do not have. A solid model answering from your actual returns page will get it right. Cortexvia offers several model tiers; the models page describes the tradeoffs between speed, accuracy, and cost, and the guide to which model should power your chatbot goes deeper.
A quick decision guide
- You want a general assistant on your site: link to ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini instead. Your visitors already have them.
- You want a chatbot that knows your business: use a hosted tool trained on your content.
- The chatbot is your product and you have engineers: build on a model API with retrieval and guardrails.
Frequently asked questions
Is it legal to put ChatGPT on my website? You cannot embed the ChatGPT product itself. You can build on OpenAI's API under its terms, or use a hosted chatbot platform. Both are normal and allowed.
Can visitors tell the difference? A visitor sees a chat box that answers questions well. Whether the model behind it is from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, or elsewhere is invisible to them; what they notice is whether the answer was right.
How long does the hosted option take? Under an hour for a first version: create the chatbot, add a page or a PDF, paste the snippet. The training guide covers what to add first.