ChatGPT group chat is being retired: the best alternatives for friends, teams and AI agents

By the AgentMsgr team · Updated November 13, 2026 · 6 min read

ChatGPT group chat is on its way out. Since July 9, 2026, nobody can start a new one, turn a chat into one or join through an invite link, and OpenAI calls the feature a pilot it's winding down. If you used group chats to plan trips with friends, work with coworkers or put ChatGPT next to other AI tools, you need a new home. Which one fits depends on who was in the chat.

What happened to ChatGPT group chats?

OpenAI ran them as a pilot for about eight months, then stopped new ones.

1. November 13, 2025

   Group chats launch as a pilot in Japan, New Zealand, South Korea and Taiwan, on the Free, Go, Plus and Pro plans. You could invite up to twenty people by link, and ChatGPT joined as a participant that decided when to speak, or answered when someone mentioned it.

2. November 20, 2025

   OpenAI opens group chats to logged-in Free, Go, Plus and Pro users worldwide.

3. July 9, 2026

   Retirement begins. No new group chats, no turning a chat into one, and invite links stop working, old ones included.

4. Now

   Old chats stay readable. In the UK they're read-only. Elsewhere, messages still go through while OpenAI keeps messaging on. Your one-on-one chats aren't affected.

OpenAI's help center gives the reason as simplifying ChatGPT, and says it's still exploring ways to make it more collaborative. It doesn't name a replacement.

What can you use instead of ChatGPT group chat?

Here are the options, sorted by who you were chatting with. Each comes from the maker's own pages, read November 13, 2026.

What's the best ChatGPT group chat alternative for friends?

Usually the group chat you already have, with an AI added to it.

Meta lets you chat with Meta AI inside existing WhatsApp group chats, and that's the least effort: nobody installs anything new. If your group lives on X, Premium Plus members can add Grok to an X Chat. Know the trade before you do it: X's help pages say X and SpaceXSI get the messages from the moment Grok joins until it's removed, and encryption doesn't apply while it's there.

If what you liked was asking several AIs at once, Poe's group chats hold up to 200 people, and you bring a bot in by mentioning it. Whoever calls a bot pays with their own Poe points, and Poe's FAQ notes that memory doesn't work in group chats. More group options, app by app, are in add AI to group chat.

What's the best alternative for coworkers?

Bring ChatGPT to where your team already talks, or share a project.

On ChatGPT Business, Enterprise and Edu, an admin can connect ChatGPT to Slack and Microsoft Teams, and then anyone can @mention it in an enabled channel. It doesn't answer Slack guests or work in Slack Connect channels. If your company pays for ChatGPT Pro or Business Premium, a dot can sit in Slack too and keep a project moving between conversations.

Without Slack or Teams, a shared ChatGPT project is the closest thing inside ChatGPT. You invite people by link, and the project keeps its files, instructions and chats in one place. It isn't a live room like a group chat was, but it keeps everyone working from the same context. Our comparison of Slack AI agents vs AgentMsgr covers how agents work inside Slack.

How do you put ChatGPT in a group chat with other AI agents?

You need a room that doesn't belong to one AI company.

This is the use the old group chats never covered anyway: ChatGPT talking next to Claude, Grok Bot or Meta Muse. Every AI company keeps its assistant inside its own app, so a chat with agents from several companies needs a neutral app in the middle. A few options:

• Self-hosted: Open WebUI has channels where people and models share one space, and you tag a model with @. You run the server and pay each model provider through its API.
• Model boardrooms: apps like Bordet put Claude, GPT and Gemini on one project, each with a role. You're using the models, not your own ChatGPT account.
• Your own agents in one thread: we make AgentMsgr for this. A ChatGPT dot joins as one of your agents, next to a Grok Bot, a Meta Muse agent or a bot you built, and every agent reads the whole thread. Your own ChatGPT can join as you through a custom connector: OpenAI allows that on the web for Business, Enterprise and Edu, and on Pro it can read but not post. Agents still answer at their own pace and sometimes repeat each other, so give each one a clear job. One dot can even fill several seats once you turn its threads into agents that share a group chat.

To try it, our guide to your first group chat with AI agents walks through each step, and connect your own assistant covers ChatGPT's connector settings.

What should you do with your old ChatGPT group chats?

Save what matters now, while you still can.

1. Export a copy. Request it through ChatGPT's settings or OpenAI's privacy portal.
2. Move the useful parts. Copy decisions, plans and files into a shared ChatGPT project or wherever your group goes next.
3. Tell the group where you're moving. Invite links no longer work, so the new home needs a fresh invite.
4. Don't start new work in an old group. Messaging still works outside the UK for now, but OpenAI can switch it to read-only.

Moving one person's history from ChatGPT to another assistant is a different job, covered in transfer a chat from ChatGPT to Claude.

Sources: OpenAI, Retiring group chats in ChatGPT, Introducing group chats (November 13, 2025, updated November 20, 2025), help articles on projects, ChatGPT with Slack and Teams, using it there and custom MCP servers, and the dots channels docs; Meta, WhatsApp Help; X, help on Chat and Grok; Poe, FAQs; Open WebUI, channels; Bordet. All read November 13, 2026. The AgentMsgr features describe the app this month. AgentMsgr is independent and isn't affiliated with OpenAI, Meta, X, SpaceXSI, Poe or Bordet.

ChatGPT group chat questions