I'm an avid reader and freelance on the side as a book reviewer for a variety of big publishers. Needless to say, I read a lot of books for both work and in my free time each month. However, I often find it hard to keep track of everything. Reviews end up in files and recommendations are forgotten in emails and text messages.
So, when I saw that ChatGPT could now build and host websites from a conversation, I decided to try creating a website for books I've read. I started by uploading just four book reviews and told ChatGPT what I wanted, then I let Codex handle the rest.
I didn't need to choose the template or even open a traditional website builder like I've done in the past. That ease is what makes ChatGPT Sites interesting and so very useful. With just an idea and a prompt, you can get a live website in under five minutes.
What is ChatGPT Sites?
OpenAI describes ChatGPT Sites as a way to create and share a live website or lightweight app from Codex. Available right on the process, Sites makes the website-building process easy with a single prompt. Just explain what you want to build, Codex creates it and you review the result. If something isn’t right, you can ask for changes in plain English before deploying the finished site.
Hosting and access controls are included, so you aren’t left with a folder full of code and no idea what to do with it. Once everything is ready, Codex can deploy the site and provide a link. Of course, you'll still have to pay for the cost of the domain and hosting, but the hard work of building a site is done for you.
Begin your site with a prompt
I started by uploading four Word documents. Each had a different book review. I was really just testing out what Sites could do, I wasn't sure what the outcome would be, so I didn't want to invest too much time at first.
Since I had already written the book reviews, each of them covering a mix of genres, I wanted to see if ChatGPT could cohesively connect the dots. I wasn't sure what I wanted out of the site, but I figured once I uploaded anything, I could get a first draft.
That said, my first request was almost comically simple: Make me a website about the books I’ve read this month.
Building the site was as simple as a conversation
Because I had already supplied the reviews, ChatGPT could use them as the source material for the site. It pulled the content together and began turning the individual documents into a more visual, browsable collection.
This was the moment the feature clicked for me. I didn’t have to describe every section, choose exact dimensions or understand how the page would be coded. I gave ChatGPT the material, explained what it represented and let it propose a way to present it.
The first version of an AI-generated site probably won’t match the picture in your head perfectly. That’s fine because it isn’t supposed to be the end of the process.
ChatGPT Sites works more like collaborating with a designer than filling out a rigid website template. Once Codex produces a version, you can ask it to change the colors, rewrite a heading, rearrange the layout or add a new feature.
You don’t need to know the technical term for what you want, either. You can say that the page feels too corporate, the book covers need to be larger or the review previews are taking up too much space.
For my site, I wanted something that felt like a reading journal rather than a business dashboard. I could continue refining that direction with requests. Having the ability to react in real time to what's in front of you makes the process much less intimidating. You don’t have to anticipate every decision before ChatGPT starts building.
ChatGPT Sites still has limits
ChatGPT generating a webpage isn’t the surprising part. AI tools have been able to produce HTML and CSS for some time. The difference here is that I didn’t have to do anything with the code. The building, revising and publishing all happened inside the same workspace. If I disliked part of the design, I could explain the problem normally instead of searching through menus or trying to find the right line of code.
I'll admit, this isn’t a replacement for a full-scale publishing platform. OpenAI says Sites is intended for focused websites and lightweight apps, rather than large or complicated software projects.
Sites also cannot connect directly to live data sources at the moment. That means, the site I created won’t automatically notice that I finished a new book or pull my latest reading activity from a publisher's or author's site.
To update it, I would need to return to Codex, add the new review and deploy the revised version. OpenAI suggests using a separate automation to collect regularly changing information, but the updates still need to be reviewed before the site is refreshed.
Sharing options can depend on your workspace settings, too. OpenAI says sites can be shared with specific people or groups, while Enterprise administrators control whether the feature is available and who can use it.
There is one more step that shouldn’t be skipped: checking the finished site yourself. OpenAI recommends opening the deployed link in Chrome because its in-app browser isn’t currently supported.
Final thoughts
ChatGPT Sites made building a website extremely easy. If you've been considering making a website and haven't known where to start, ChatGPT Sites might just be what you're looking for. I can see this feature being useful for sharing family recipes, my kids' artwork, vacation journals or anything else that's fairly niche.
For that reason, I suggest starting off with a small project and giving ChatGPT the information you already have. Give it a try and let me know what you think in the comments.
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