Custom GPTs are officially going away. OpenAI says they’re scheduled to retire on December 11, 2026. If you’ve built one that people actually use, that’s a date that you need to put on your calendar right now.
If any of you remember OpenAI’s announcement to let you monetize your GPTs, well, guess what? Whether intentional, or maybe it just worked out this way due to priorities, that promise went nowhere for most of us. OpenAI tested payments with a small group of U.S. builders, but I never got paid for Player Bits or any of my other GPTs.
I personally built several GPTs. A handful of them got traction, and one of them easily dominated everything: Player Bits. It now has over 50,000 chats.
Luckily, I decided to migrate said GPT to a chatbot platform just a few weeks before the announcement of GPTs going away.
Here’s how I turned my #1 GPT into a product with its own website, accounts, AI model, and paid plan, and how you can do the exact same thing.
When Are Custom GPTs Going Away?
The standard scheduled retirement date is December 11, 2026. Existing GPTs remain usable until the date that applies to their account or workspace. At retirement, their GPTs become inaccessible. OpenAI says certain Enterprise workspaces with an approved deferral have until February 11, 2027.
There’s also a GPT creation cutoff to watch. OpenAI lists October 26, 2026 as the planned end of new GPT creation for Enterprise users. Its current sharing guidance says personal ChatGPT accounts already can’t create or publish new GPTs. Existing GPTs can still be edited where the account’s permissions allow it. So, even if you want to edit your GPT, you better do so quickly while you still can.
OpenAI’s own migration recommendation is ChatGPT Plugins. Its planned process can move a GPT’s instructions and reference files into a plugin, but existing conversations won’t move, and custom Actions won’t transfer automatically. That’s an okay path if you want your workflow to stay inside ChatGPT, if your entire GPT use case actually fits into a ChatGPT Plugin, and you have no intention of monetizing.
Pickaxe, which I used, is a separate platform and isn’t OpenAI’s official migration tool… but that’s not a bad thing. More on that later.
More Than 3 Million GPTs Were Created in Its First Two Months
OpenAI said more than 3 million custom GPTs had been created by January 10, 2024. That’s a historical figure, not a count of active GPTs today. Still, it’s a lot of creators who may now be wondering what to do with their work. Maybe that’s also you.
If just 1% of that known 2024 total were rebuilt elsewhere, that would be more than 30,000 GPTs. That’s an illustration, not a forecast or a claim that 30,000 creators are shopping for software this week.
Some will move into ChatGPT Plugins. Others will want their own site and a way to charge customers directly. I was already working on the second option (lucky for me).
As for my own prediction of where GPTs would go in the future, when I first started building them in November of 2023, I said it was “an incredible opportunity for brands, developers, and creatives”. Sadly, that’s not really the way it all played out. Sometimes people are wrong (even me).
My GPT Had 50,000+ Chats, So I Turned It Into a Product
The original Player Bits GPT: Your Digital Wingman (if this link doesn’t work, it’s because you clicked after GPTs went away) lives inside ChatGPT. It gives men dating advice without sounding like a robotic “everything happens for a reason” machine. The GPT’s 50,000+ chats and 4.4/5.0 rating told me the concept was something people enjoyed using. Those chats aren’t 50,000 customers, of course. I wish.
I wanted more control over the experience. On PlayerBits.ai, I could create a distinct brand, test different AI models, set usage limits, accept payments, and give the coach memory so its advice could take a person’s circumstances into account. I could also build a product that people reach directly, without requiring them to find a GPT Store listing, which is now buried deep within ChatGPT’s settings. And, of course, soon, it won’t exist at all.
Player Bits Pro launched September 5, 2026. It’s a standalone web app built with Pickaxe. Users currently get 10 free messages, then can subscribe for $9.00 per month. Those are the offer details at the time I’m writing this; check the site for the current plan.
The experience is still simple. You sign in and talk to an AI dating coach. There’s no giant dashboard pretending that more buttons mean better advice. The product has to earn its price through the quality of the conversation.
How I Migrated My Custom GPT
There’s no magic “turn this GPT into my own business” button. However, with the correct usage of AI, a version of that button is closer to entrepreneurs than it ever has before in human history. Here’s how I migrated my GPT:
- Immediately save the original work. Copy your GPT’s instructions, knowledge files, conversation starters, and details of any Actions. Then, make a backup of all of it. Also, save a handful of prompts that show how the GPT behaves when it’s working well.
- Decide where your GPT belongs. If you want to keep the workflow in ChatGPT and don’t want to monetize, look at OpenAI’s Plugin route. If you want an independent customer relationship and your own checkout, choose an external platform or build an app. I chose Pickaxe.
- Rebuild the instructions and knowledge. I transferred the parts that made Player Bits Player Bits, then refined and improved the voice, advice rules, and source material. This is manual work, not an automatic import of your GPT. If you want, you can just use what you were already using. Personally, I like constantly enhancing everything.
- Test the model, not just the prompt. I tried several AI models using the same kinds of dating questions. Some were too stiff. Some missed instructions. I compared the advice, writing style, speed, and cost before settling on a setup I liked. A prompt that works beautifully with one model may feel oddly formal with another.
Also, be sure to compare prices of each model vs. how well they respond to find your sweet spot. The GLM and Gemini Flash models are known for being inexpensive, yet intelligent models that work well for chatbots. - Set up memory and access. Dating advice depends on who the person is and what has already happened. Pickaxe can retrieve user-specific memories for later conversations. I configured accounts, initial free usage, and a paid access level around that experience.
- Make payments and usage limits work. Pickaxe supports subscriptions, one-time purchases, and usage-based options through its access settings. I went with 10 free messages followed by a monthly subscription. Test the whole checkout and upgrade flow yourself before sending traffic to it.
- Make it feel like your product + add analytics. This is very important. The default Pickaxe templates are not good. I branded the entire chatbot experience to PlayerBits.ai and spent a lot of time customizing the interface with CSS via vibe coding. I then added GA4 analytics for visits, signups, upgrade clicks, and purchases. If you can’t tell where customers came from, you’ll have a hard time deciding what to improve.
- Create a website, landing page, or something else online that links to your bot. People need a way to find it and access it. Personally, I spent around eight hours vibe coding a website using ChatGPT Sites and then hosted the entire thing on Cloudflare for free.
- Direct your current GPT users to your new product. Do this as soon as you possibly can. Every day you wait is a day that you’re not getting free leads to your paid bot.
Here’s the GPT message I created for Player Bits. I added to the instructions of the bot to append this message at the end of the first response my GPT provides to users. Feel free to steal this strategy and customize it to whatever you need.
The Platform I Used to Sell My Custom GPT
When people ask for a platform for selling custom GPTs, what they usually need is a way to rebuild a useful GPT-like experience and charge for access. That’s what Pickaxe did for me. You can try it now and get 10% off with this link.
I chose Pickaxe as my platform because it enables one person to launch a real AI product without first building an entire subscription app. I’m good at vibe coding, but when it comes to user data and security, vibe coding is not the way to go.
Pickaxe gave me a place to put my GPT’s custom instructions, all of its knowledge files, model options, user accounts, memory, access levels, usage controls, and Stripe payments. I could focus my time on the coach itself and the customer experience instead of hiring a developer to QA some vibe coded security setup that I configured.
There are some downsides, of course. I’m working inside Pickaxe’s product design, so I can’t control every detail the way I could with custom software built from scratch. Your new chatbot you create from your GPT will not have many features. Also, some design/interface changes and customization took a surprising amount of CSS vibe coding work (although, a lot less time than coding it by hand).
If you need unusual workflows or pricing, a native mobile app for iOS and Android, or precise control of every screen and feature, evaluate if you really need them before committing to any no-code platform, which includes Pickaxe.
Can You Monetize Custom GPTs? Yes, But Keep This in Mind
The question “how do I monetize custom GPTs?” sounds like a software question. It’s also a marketing question.
Building the paid version (Player Bits Pro) was easier than convincing my free GPT users to sign up somewhere else and pull out a credit card (so far… it’s only been 20 days at the time of this writing). A GPT’s chat count shows engagement with a free experience. It doesn’t prove demand for a subscription. I’m very early in the paid GPT journey, and I’m still testing how to explain the product and price it at an equilibrium price point.
The AI model itself is inexpensive to run for my use case. Getting the right people to try the product, showing them the difference, and bringing them back after that first visit may matter more to the business than shaving a fraction of one cent off each response.
If you’re migrating a popular GPT to another platform, such as Pickaxe, track the entire path with GA4: old GPT to website, website to signup, signup to trial use, and trial use to purchase. I did. This will allow you to track the pressure points in your funnel so you can fix it and adjust it as needed.
FAQs About the Custom GPT Shutdown
That’s OpenAI’s standard scheduled retirement date. Affected Enterprise workspaces with a qualified, approved deferral may have until February 11, 2027.
No. No automatic GPT import is part of the process I used. I rebuilt Player Bits’ instructions, knowledge, and product experience in Pickaxe, made it much better, then tested the result and refined as needed.
If you want the workflow to remain in ChatGPT, your GPT is qualified to behave like a Plugin instead, and you don’t want to monetize it, start with OpenAI’s Plugin migration. If you want your own website, payment flow, model choice, and customer relationship, an independent app is worth looking into. You’ll have more work to do, but the payoff could be massively bigger.
OpenAI has not released an official statement regarding why they are removing GPTs. Speculation would say that GPTs either didn’t get enough usage, didn’t provide enough revenue for them, or don’t fit in nicely enough to OpenAI’s future product plans.
Most likely, yes. After December 11, 2026, GPTs will be gone. Consider contacting the creator of the GPTs that you use frequently to see if they have a migration plan to provide continued access to their GPT.
OpenAI tested GPT earnings with a small group of U.S. builders, but never rolled out payments widely. I never got paid for any of my GPTs, and with GPTs retiring, I wouldn’t count on a payout now.
Wrapping It Up
Well, it’s over. GPTs will be dead soon. Bon voyage. OpenAI wants creators to move their work to Plugins.
Some people predicted it a long time ago, while others were shocked. I was somewhere in between.
With custom GPTs going away on December 11, 2026, it’s a good time to save what you’ve built and decide where it should live next. OpenAI offers a path toward Plugins. I took the independent route with Player Bits Pro.
If you want to see the finished product, try Player Bits Pro (10 messages free), even if you don’t need dating advice. Trying it will show you how a highly custom, awesome-looking bot looks in Pickaxe.
Have you built a custom GPT you’re planning to move? Did you try Pickaxe and have any feedback about your experience? Tell me what you’re doing with it in the comment section below.
Until next time, remember to run the prompts and prompt the planet.
Disclosure: I use Pickaxe for Player Bits Pro. The Pickaxe links in this article are affiliate links. Get 10% off a qualifying plan, and I may earn a commission if you buy. Win-win.
