What is ChatGPT search?

By the Variask team · Updated

Definition

ChatGPT search is the part of ChatGPT that searches the web for current information and shows answers with cited sources. It decides when to search for many questions, especially about products, news and prices.

With Variask: Variask tracks ChatGPT answers with search, including the sources they cite.

How it works

  • ChatGPT decides whether a question needs live information.
  • It searches the web and reads relevant pages.
  • It writes an answer and links to its sources.
  • OAI-SearchBot crawls pages for it.

What it means for brands

  • Allow OAI-SearchBot so your pages can be found and cited.
  • Pages that answer the question clearly are cited more often.
Deep dive in Variask UniversityHow to get your brand recommended by ChatGPT

Questions

ChatGPT search:
common questions

No. It searches when it judges a question needs current information, or when the user asks it to.

Allow OAI-SearchBot, publish clear answers, and be present on the sources it cites.

Related terms

Keep exploring

Measurement

AI citations

AI citations are the links an AI assistant shows next to its answer to point to the pages it used, such as the numbered sources in Perplexity or the source links in ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews.

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Technical

GPTBot

GPTBot is OpenAI's web crawler that collects publicly available pages that may be used to train OpenAI's models. It is separate from OAI-SearchBot, which powers search in ChatGPT.

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Commerce

ChatGPT shopping results

ChatGPT shopping results are the product cards ChatGPT shows, with images, prices, reviews and links, when it decides a question is about buying something. OpenAI says they are chosen independently and are not ads.

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Full glossary