ChatGPT
OpenAI's consumer LLM product — chat, browse, and run plugins on the web via GPT-class models.
Definition
ChatGPT is OpenAI's consumer AI assistant, launched in late 2022. The web/app version reaches the live internet via the GPTBot (training), OAI-SearchBot (live retrieval), and ChatGPT-User (user-triggered URL fetches) crawlers. Getting cited in ChatGPT means appearing in the synthesized answer and source list when ChatGPT searches the web.
When to use
Optimize for ChatGPT citations by allowing OAI-SearchBot and ChatGPT-User in robots.txt and publishing high-trust, answer-extractable content. Blocking GPTBot does not affect retrieval — only future model training.
See also
- GPTBot — OpenAI's web crawler for future model training data — does not affect ChatGPT live retrieval.
- OAI-SearchBot — OpenAI's retrieval crawler that fetches pages for ChatGPT search — block it and you're invisible to ChatGPT.
- Perplexity — AI answer engine that searches the live web and returns synthesized answers with inline citations.
Mentioned in
- AI search invisibility: 7 reasons your site isn't cited (and how to fix each)
- GA4's new AI Assistant channel: setup, regex fallback, and what it misses in 2026
- How to get cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude in 2026
- Launching Citation Intelligence MCP: free, self-hosted AI citation tracking
- Launching the AI-SEO MCP: 13 tools to get your pages cited by AI assistants
- What is the Model Context Protocol (MCP)? A 2026 primer