ChatBot UI

Last reviewed Sep 13, 2026 · 783 words

Do not start a new ChatBot UI install in 2026 unless you have a specific reason to. The project that taught 33,343 GitHub stargazers what a self-hosted ChatGPT clone looks like is no longer actively maintained, Umbrel has pulled it from its app store for exactly that reason, and the tools that grew up in its shadow now do everything it does plus local models, RAG, and multi-user auth. It still works. It is still easy. It is also a dead end, and the honest guide is one that tells you where the exits are.

There are two ChatBot UIs, and they are not the same app

The name covers two codebases with different architectures. The original, now on the legacy branch, is a single Next.js app that talks straight to the OpenAI API from your browser and stores every conversation in the browser's local storage. No database, no login, no server-side state at all. The 2024 rewrite on the main branch is a different animal: it requires a Supabase project (Postgres plus auth plus storage) as its backend, supports multiple providers including Ollama, and keeps chats server-side per user.

The removal notice that appears on catalogue listings refers to the packaged legacy version, which no longer matches the upstream architecture. Existing installs keep working because they have nothing to break: a static-ish frontend plus your API key.

Who still runs the legacy version, and why it is defensible

The legacy branch is the smallest possible ChatGPT-style frontend. It needs a 512 MB container, no database, and one environment variable. If your requirements are "one person, OpenAI models only, a nicer interface than the official one with a prompt library and export to JSON", it is genuinely adequate, and its lack of moving parts is a feature. I know people who have run it untouched since 2023 and see no reason to migrate.

git clone -b legacy https://github.com/mckaywrigley/chatbot-ui.git
cd chatbot-ui
docker build -t chatbot-ui .
docker run -d -e OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-... -p 3000:3000 --restart unless-stopped chatbot-ui

There is no maintained prebuilt image, so you build it yourself from the branch; the build takes 2 to 3 minutes and the running container idles well under the 512 MB it is rated for.

Two cautions. Conversations live in browser storage, so clearing site data deletes them; use the export button regularly and treat the JSON as your backup. And there is no authentication, so never expose it publicly without a reverse proxy login in front, or anyone who finds the URL is spending your OpenAI credit.

The v2 install is more work than the alternatives it competes with

The main branch asks you to stand up Supabase, run its migrations, configure auth, and then run the Next.js app pointing at it. That is a fair amount of ceremony for a chat UI, and it lands you with a stack that is heavier than Open WebUI, which ships as one container with SQLite and gives you local models through Ollama, document upload, web search, per-user accounts, and an admin panel. LibreChat is the other mature option if you want many providers side by side with fine-grained model access per user. Both projects release frequently. ChatBot UI's main branch does not.

What "not maintained" costs you in practice

For a tool that wraps someone else's API, staleness bites in a specific way: the provider changes something and nobody patches the client. OpenAI has retired models and adjusted endpoints more than once since the last meaningful ChatBot UI activity. Today the legacy branch still functions because the chat completions endpoint is stable and you can set the model name yourself, but each provider-side change is a coin flip on whether you get a fix. There are no security releases either, which matters less for a browser-only app and more for the Supabase-backed one holding other people's conversations.

What I'd do

If you are choosing today, skip it: install Open WebUI, add your OpenAI key alongside a local model, and you have everything ChatBot UI offered plus the parts it never got to. The self-hosted ChatGPT alternatives page walks through the wider field, and the AI chat UIs category lists the ones under active development. If you already run the legacy branch for one user and it does what you need, leave it alone, keep exporting your chats, and keep it off the public internet. Migrate when it breaks, not before, and expect that day to arrive.