How to Find your OpenAI API key for ChatGPT

Every OpenAI account includes a secret API key that lets you connect to OpenAI's APIs from third-party tools and applications. You need this key any time you want to integrate OpenAI models into platforms like Social Intents, Zapier, or your own custom applications.

What You Can Do with an OpenAI API Key

Your API key gives you access to OpenAI's full suite of models and services:

  • ChatGPT  - Build conversational AI chatbots, virtual assistants, and customer support agents powered by natural language understanding
  • DALLE - Generate AI images and artwork from text descriptions
  • Whisper - Transcribe and translate audio across dozens of languages with OpenAI's speech recognition model
  • Sora - Create AI-generated video clips from text prompts
  • Embeddings API - Power semantic search, content recommendations, and clustering with vectorized text representations
  • Moderation API - Automatically detect and filter unsafe or policy-violating content in your applications
  • Assistants API - Build AI agents with built-in tools like code execution, file search, and function calling

One API key gives you access to all of these capabilities from a single OpenAI account.

Step 1: Sign In to Your OpenAI Account

First sign in or sign up for your OpenAI account.  You can find sign up and login link here: https://platform.openai.com/

OpenAI Create your account

Step 2: Open the API Keys Page

Once logged in, click on your profile name or Icon to open the menu.

Then select the 'View API Keys' option as highlighted in the screenshot below.

View OpenAI Keys

Step 3: Create a New Secret Key

On the API Keys page, you will see a list of existing Secret Keys.  Just select 'Create new secret key' to generate a new key

to use your your client integrations like when you want to sue ChatGPT into your Live Chat chatbots.

Step 4: Copy and Save Your Key

Then click the green icon on the popup page to copy your OpenAI secret key to a safe place.

Find your OpenAI API Key

Step 5: Enable Billing (Required for API Access)

OpenAI requires a payment method on file before your API key will work. If you have not added billing yet:

  1. Go to Settings > Billing in the OpenAI dashboard
  2. Click Add payment method and enter your card details
  3. Optionally set a monthly usage limit to control costs

New OpenAI accounts typically receive free API credits to get started. Once those credits are used, API calls will be charged to your payment method.

If you're experiencing issues logging into or setting up ChatGPT, make sure you have follow these OpenAI login troubleshooting tips.

Using Your OpenAI API Key with Social Intents

Once you have your API key, you can use it to power an AI chatbot on your website through Social Intents:

  1. Log in to your Social Intents dashboard
  2. Go to My Widgets and select your chat widget
  3. Open the AI Chatbot Settings tab
  4. Select ChatGPT as the AI engine
  5. Paste your OpenAI API key into the API Key field
  6. Choose your model, add training content, and save

Tip: On any paid Social Intents plan, you can use GPT-4o without providing an API key — these models are included free with your subscription. You only need an OpenAI API key if you want to use a different OpenAI model.

Troubleshooting

API key not working?

  • Make sure billing is enabled on your OpenAI account at platform.openai.com/settings/organization/billing
  • Check that your API key has not been revoked — go to the API Keys page and verify it is listed as active
  • If you are getting a 401 error, generate a new key and update it in your integration

ChatGPT login issues?

  • Clear your browser cache and cookies, then try signing in again
  • If you signed up with Google or Microsoft, make sure you are using the same login method
  • Visit OpenAI's status page to check for any outages

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