How to connect ChatGPT To Google Sheets using Google Apps Script and the ChatGPT API

On March 1st, 2023, OpenAI finally announced the eagerly-awaited API for ChatGPT. And the world took notice! Connecting ChatGPT to Google Sheets has never been easier!

I’ve been looking forward to this for a while because I wanted to connect ChatGPT to Google Sheets so I could quickly speed up a project I’ve been working on.

You might also like: How to connect GPT-4 to Google Sheets.

How to connect ChatGPT with Google Sheets using Google Apps Script

Here’s how you can integrate the ChatGPT API with Google Sheets using the gpt-3.5-turbo model.

Step 1: Get An API Key

You’ll need an API key from Open AI. When logged into your Open AI account, you create your API key here

Step 2: Enter Apps Scripts

From Google Sheets, click on Extensions in the main menu and select Apps Script.

Within the code editor of Apps Script, paste the following code and don’t forget to add your own unique API key where it says “YOUR API KEY” on the first line.

const SECRET_KEY = "YOUR API KEY";
const MAX_TOKENS = 800;
const TEMPERATURE = 0.9;

function AI_ChatGPT(prompt, temperature = 0.4, model = "gpt-3.5-turbo") {
  const url = "https://api.openai.com/v1/chat/completions";
  const payload = {
    model: model,
    messages: [
      { role: "system", content: "You are a helpful assistant." },
      { role: "user", content: prompt },
    ],
    temperature: TEMPERATURE,
    max_tokens: MAX_TOKENS,
  };
  const options = {
    contentType: "application/json",
    headers: { Authorization: "Bearer " + SECRET_KEY },
    payload: JSON.stringify(payload),
  };
  const res = JSON.parse(UrlFetchApp.fetch(url, options).getContentText());
  return res.choices[0].message.content.trim();
}

Once you’ve put your API key into the quotation marks on the first line, click the Save icon and go back into Google Sheets.

NOTE: You may have to give Google certain permissions. I allowed whatever they were looking for to get it working. I can't provide a tutorial on this because it's nuanced and requires a valid Google account etc. Also, Google often change how they do things, so updating this guide would soon become a nightmare for me. Hopefully this part goes easy for you.

Step 3: Complete in Google Sheets

Go back into Google Sheets.

Showing you exactly what you can do with prompts and spreadsheet layout is beyond the scope of this basic guide. I’m sure you’ll figure it out and have fun doing so.

But as a quick example, to show you that it really works, if you have a topic title in cell A1, you can place this formula below in any other cell and then let it do some magic!

=AI_ChatGPT("Create an introduction paragraph for this topic: "&A1&".")

Obviously, that’s just a basic example prompt to get the ChatGPT API working properly with Sheets.

Now, it’s up to you to tweak to your own needs.

Have fun adding the ChatGPT API (GPT 3.5 Turbo model) to Google Sheets!

And wow, this new ChatGPT API is much faster than my previous GPT3 integration.

With a little Google Sheet trickery, you can easily create an entire batch of AI-generated titles, meta descriptions, definitions, paragraphs of text, and if you’re that way inclined, even entire articles.

Honestly, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. When I get time, I’ll update this article with some great case study uses.

Now, let’s get real. Unless your prompts are ultra-amazing, you simply won’t get high-quality “publish-ready” blog posts out of ChatGPT.

Facts will still need to be checked because ChatGPT likes to invent stuff and will sound very convincing when spewing out fictional facts.

Although, some people are having great success ranking content out of the box, I really don’t think it’s a long-term strategy. It’ll work, until it doesn’t.

Anyway, whatever you decide to do with it is entirely up to you.

Frequently Asked Questions About ChatGPT