Model: ChatGPT
On 29 September 2026, OpenAI gave ChatGPT public profiles and a Sites showcase, turning a tool you ask questions into a place where people and brands publish work and get found. Here’s what a new discovery surface inside ChatGPT means for how AI answers represent you.
Source: OpenAI ChatGPT release notes — public profiles and Sites showcase (29 September 2026)
- On 29 September 2026, ChatGPT added public profiles and a Sites showcase, part of a wider release that also brought Pages, Space and a new Pro tier.
- A ChatGPT profile gathers your bio, activity and the Sites you choose to showcase; it is private by default and shareable by link.
- Published Sites can now be edited inside ChatGPT and scheduled to refresh, so pages live and change on the platform.
- This turns ChatGPT from a question box into a publishing and discovery surface — a new place your brand can be seen.
- A profile is not a ranking signal; reconnAI tracks how ChatGPT actually represents you when people ask about your category.
What ChatGPT actually launched
On 29 September 2026, OpenAI shipped a batch of ChatGPT updates, and two of them change where brands can appear: public profiles and a Sites showcase. A profile now gathers your bio, your activity and the Sites you choose to feature, while a published Site can be edited inside ChatGPT and set to refresh on a schedule.
These landed alongside Pages (collaborative documents), Space (a workspace that pulls Pages and files together), a new Pro 500 tier with an Astra Ultrafast speed option, and GPT-6.1 Sol in Work and Codex. The model news matters for power users, but the profile and Sites changes matter for anyone who wants to be found.
From a question box to a place to publish
ChatGPT is no longer only where people ask questions; it is becoming a place where they publish and share. With a Site you can build, an editor built into ChatGPT, schedules that keep it current and a profile that showcases it, OpenAI is assembling a lightweight publishing stack inside the assistant itself.
We saw the first step when ChatGPT Sites opened the in-ChatGPT builder; profiles and the showcase are the discovery layer on top. The pattern echoes the identity move we covered in Sign in with ChatGPT: OpenAI wants more of the journey to begin and end inside its own product.
Why public profiles matter for brands
A public ChatGPT profile is a new, owned surface where a brand or expert can present who they are and point to the Sites they have published. It is private by default, but once you make it public you can share its link with anyone signed in to ChatGPT, and it shows your bio, activity and showcased Sites rather than any private chats.
That is modest today — closer to a shareable card than a public directory — but it is the first time ChatGPT gives individuals and organisations a consistent place to be represented. As with any new channel, the brands that claim and maintain it early tend to benefit when it grows, the same logic that made us watch the shift from custom GPTs to plugins so closely.
What the Sites showcase changes
The Sites showcase lets owners and editors on Plus and Pro feature published Sites on a profile, edit them from the browser inside ChatGPT and schedule recurring updates through Automations. Published pages are no longer static one-offs; they are living content that sits inside the platform and can be refreshed without leaving it.
That matters for visibility, because content that is current, structured and clearly authored is exactly what a careful model prefers to lean on. Keeping a Site accurate and up to date is the same discipline behind being ready for AI search and a sound GEO strategy.
Is a ChatGPT profile a ranking signal?
No. Making a profile public does not make ChatGPT recommend you more often, and showcasing a Site is not a shortcut into its answers. Profiles are shared with signed-in users by link, not published as an indexed ranking surface, and OpenAI is explicit that a shared profile does not expose your conversations.
The honest read is that these are distribution and presentation features, not a new lever on what the model says. What shapes whether ChatGPT names you is still the evidence it can find and trust about you across the open web — the logic behind how LLMs decide which brands to cite.
Where this fits in ChatGPT’s bigger shift
Profiles and Sites are one more step in ChatGPT becoming a platform rather than a chatbot. The same release added ways to sign in to other products with ChatGPT, use your ChatGPT allowance in participating apps and build richer interactive plugins — all moves that keep users inside the ecosystem.
We have tracked this arc through plugins in Voice, the parallel Claude plugin directory and flagship launches like GPT-6 Astra. The direction is clear: the assistant is turning into a front door, and being present at that door is becoming its own discipline.
What this means for your content
Treat ChatGPT as a channel, not a novelty. If you publish Sites, keep them accurate, clearly authored and consistent with the facts on your main website, because a model that encounters the same claims everywhere is a model that can cite you without hedging.
None of this replaces the fundamentals. Clean, structured content that states who you serve and the evidence behind your claims still does the heavy lifting across ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini alike — the point of Google’s own llms.txt guidance.
What the profiles and Sites update changes
OpenAI added ChatGPT profiles and the Sites showcase on 29 September 2026.
How to check your ChatGPT visibility
Because new surfaces tend to spread quickly, it is worth taking a baseline now. Here is a short, practical way to see how ChatGPT handles the questions around your brand — today is 1 October 2026:
- List your real questions. Write down the questions your customers actually ask before choosing you.
- Ask ChatGPT directly. Run those questions and record which brands, products and sources it names.
- Note the framing. Watch how it describes you, who it mentions alongside you and what it caveats.
- Check the sources. Where it browses, see which pages it leans on and whether your own content is among them.
- Compare across models and regions. Repeat in Claude, Gemini and Perplexity, and in your key markets, since answers differ.
- Track the trend. One run is a snapshot; the value is in watching movement as new surfaces roll out.
How reconnAI tracks ChatGPT
reconnAI monitors how the leading AI models — ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Copilot and Google AI Overview — answer questions across regions, and re-baselines that tracking whenever a platform ships something that changes behaviour. ChatGPT opening a publishing and discovery layer is exactly that kind of moment, because it widens where brands can appear.
It joins a busy run of shifts we have followed lately, from the Claude Sonnet 5.5 launch and credit scores in ChatGPT to Deep Research and the wider picture in this week in AI. If you want to see how ChatGPT represents your brand when people ask about your category, get in touch with our team, explore how AI visibility tracking works, or read our overview of ChatGPT advertising for where paid placement is heading.
ChatGPT profiles: your questions answered
What did OpenAI launch? On 29 September 2026, ChatGPT added public profiles and a Sites showcase, alongside Pages, Space, a new Pro 500 tier and GPT-6.1 Sol in Work and Codex.
What is a ChatGPT profile? It gathers your bio, activity and the Sites you choose to showcase. It is private by default; you can make it public and share its link with other people signed in to ChatGPT, and it does not reveal your conversations.
Does a public profile boost my AI visibility? Not directly. A profile is a presentation and sharing surface, not a ranking signal. What earns a mention is still the evidence ChatGPT can find and trust about you across the web.
What changed for Sites? Owners and editors on Plus and Pro can edit a published Site inside ChatGPT, showcase it on a profile and schedule recurring updates, so pages stay current without leaving the platform.
How do I track my visibility across models? Baseline the questions your customers ask, run them across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity, and watch how the answers change over time — which is what reconnAI automates.
About reconnAI
reconnAI tracks how the major AI models represent topics and sources across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Copilot and Google AI Overview — across multiple regions. We monitor how those models answer and how they change over time, so you can stay ahead of shifts in the AI landscape.
Last updated: 1 October 2026.