AI Content School · Live Beginner Workshop
Your Custom GPTs are going away. I'll show you what to do with them.
Mike Wayne · [Day, Date] · [Time] ET · Live on Zoom
Today's plan
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Part 1
What happens to everything you already built.
The dates
The Migrate to plugin option is appearing account by account.
Planned end of creating new Custom GPTs.
Custom GPTs are scheduled to retire.
Later date for Enterprise workspaces with an approved deferral.
OpenAI's current schedule. Dates can change, so follow the notice in your own account.
If you built Custom GPTs
Your GPT already holds the hard part: what you wanted the AI to know and how you wanted it to behave. The new system organizes those pieces differently.
What moves
| In your Custom GPT | In the new Plugin | |
|---|---|---|
| Your GPT instructions | → | A Skill inside the plugin |
| Your knowledge files | → | The plugin's reference files |
| Your connected apps | → | Apps inside the plugin |
Migration uses your GPT's latest published version. Drafts and unpublished edits stay behind.
What doesn't move
They don't transfer. Anything built on them stops working until you set up a replacement.
Chat history with the GPT stays with the GPT.
The plugin doesn't carry your GPT's selected model.
The new plugin starts private. Nobody you shared the GPT with gets it automatically.
Part 2
Plugins, Skills, reference files and apps.
The four pieces
The container that holds your Skills, files and connected apps.
Reusable instructions telling ChatGPT how to handle one specific job.
The information a Skill can use while it does that job.
Services and data your Plugin can connect to.
Same work, new shape
Before
After
If your GPT uses custom actions, those connections get rebuilt separately.
The piece that matters most
Typed once. Gets one result. Lives in your notes and depends on you remembering it.
Saved once. Runs the same process every time. ChatGPT loads it when the job matches its description.
Your GPT instructions become a Skill, so the clearer those instructions are, the better the replacement behaves.
Part 3
A real Custom GPT, start to finish.
The process
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Live walkthrough
In ChatGPT
Review the migration details, then follow the prompts to create the plugin.
Two things to know
Before you migrate
Drafts and unpublished changes don't come across.
Keep your own copy outside ChatGPT.
So you can check nothing is missing afterward.
You'll run these against the plugin to compare results.
After you migrate
Check that it
Keep in mind
After migrating, the original GPT still works until retirement, but it becomes read-only. Make future changes in the plugin.
Your turn
No migration option yet? Do the prep now and migrate the day it appears.
Part 4
Actions, sharing, priorities and building the new way.
Priorities
Your daily drivers earn the first slot.
They need time to switch over too.
Protect the knowledge you'd hate to lose.
Half-finished GPTs can retire quietly.
Troubleshooting
Access arrives account by account and workspace by workspace.
You have to be in the account or workspace where the GPT was created.
Drafts can't be migrated.
Plugins have to be enabled for the workspace.
The one that needs work
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An available app may already cover what the action did.
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A replacement connection may need a custom MCP server and some technical setup.
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Don't assume a rebuilt integration does everything the old action did.
This is the part to start early, especially for anything a client depends on.
Sharing
People who used your GPT get nothing automatically.
Give access, then ask one person to install and test it.
A public plugin goes through its own submission process.
If you sell or deliver a GPT to clients, plan the switch before the retirement date.
Going forward
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Preserve the useful parts of the GPTs you spent hours on and move them into the new system.
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For new projects, start with Skills and Plugins instead of a system that is being retired.
Don't wait until the last week
Custom GPTs are currently scheduled to retire on December 11, 2026. That is time to prepare, not time to forget about it.
Keep going
Optional add-on
$50
Membership
$50/mo
Q&A
Migrate one GPT this week. Bring your questions to the community.
Mike Wayne · AI Content School · [email protected]