This ChatGPT Team setup guide covers ChatGPT Team (now officially rebranded by OpenAI as ChatGPT
Business, though the “Team” name is still used across OpenAI’s
own sign-up help docs) is OpenAI’s self-serve plan for small teams and
growing companies that want shared AI access without enterprise-level
contracts (What
is ChatGPT Business?; Introducing
ChatGPT Team). This guide walks you through creating an account,
picking the right billing option, configuring your workspace, and
getting your team productive with ChatGPT in the first week — all based
on OpenAI’s current, published plan details.
Last updated: August 2026
Table of Contents
What You’ll Need Before You
Start
- An email address (ideally a company domain,
e.g. yourname@company.com) or the ability to sign in with
Google/Microsoft - At least one other teammate to invite — ChatGPT
Team/Business requires a minimum of 2 users on the plan (What
is ChatGPT Business?) - A payment method (credit card) for checkout, or approval to expense
a business subscription - A decision on monthly vs. annual billing, since
annual billing is meaningfully cheaper per seat - A short list of tools your team already uses (Slack, Google Drive,
GitHub, SharePoint) that you’ll want to connect once your workspace is
live (ChatGPT
Business)
Step 1: ChatGPT Team Setup — Create Your Account
- Go to your ChatGPT account and choose to sign up for ChatGPT
Team directly — if you don’t already have a ChatGPT account,
the flow will first prompt you to create one, then upgrade you to Team
(How
do I sign up for ChatGPT Team?). - If creating a new account, sign up with an email address (or
Google/Microsoft single sign-on) and verify it. - During the upgrade flow, choose between flexible monthly
billing or the discounted annual plan (How
do I sign up for ChatGPT Team?). - Complete checkout — you’ll need at least 2 seats to activate the
plan (What
is ChatGPT Business?). - Once your workspace is created, invite your
teammates by email directly from the admin/workspace settings
so they land in the same shared Team workspace (How
do I sign up for ChatGPT Team?).
Note: OpenAI now labels this plan “ChatGPT Business” in billing and
marketing pages, but its own help center still titles the sign-up
article “How do I sign up for ChatGPT Team?” — functionally, this is the
same plan and signup flow, just a naming update, per OpenAI’s own
announcement that “Features and pricing haven’t changed” (Introducing
ChatGPT Team, August 2025 update).
A practical tip: if you already have a personal ChatGPT Plus
subscription, you don’t need to cancel it before setting up Team — the
Team workspace is a separate subscription tied to your organization, and
you can keep a personal Plus account for individual, non-work use if you
want to. When you’re the one initiating signup, you’ll automatically
become the workspace’s first admin, which matters for Step 3 of this ChatGPT Team setup below.
Step 2: Choose the Right Plan
Important 2026 naming note: OpenAI renamed the
“ChatGPT Team” plan to “ChatGPT
Business” on August 29, 2025. OpenAI has stated this was a name
change only, with no changes to features, pricing, usage limits, or
security (OpenAI
ChatGPT Business Release Notes). If you’re searching for “ChatGPT
Team” pricing in 2026, this is the plan you want — it now appears as
ChatGPT Business on OpenAI’s site.
| Plan | Monthly Price | Annual Price (per user, billed yearly) | Users/Seats Included | Key Features | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plus | $20/month (no annual discount offered) | Not offered — billed monthly only | Individual (1 user) | GPT-5.5/5.6 access, expanded messages & uploads, image generation, expanded Deep Research, memory & context, Projects, scheduled tasks, custom GPTs, Codex access | Individuals wanting more power and productivity from ChatGPT (OpenAI ChatGPT Pricing) |
| Team (now called Business) | $25 per user/month, billed monthly | $20 per user/month, billed annually | 2-user minimum, up to 1,000 seats per purchase | Unlimited GPT-5 messages, GPT-5 thinking, Deep Research, Codex baseline access, secure shared workspace, admin console, SAML SSO, MFA, 60+ app connectors (Slack, Google Drive, SharePoint, GitHub, etc.), data excluded from training by default, SOC 2 Type 2 alignment | Startups and growing teams (2+ people) that want admin controls and data privacy without an Enterprise contract (OpenAI Business Pricing; price cut confirmed in OpenAI Help Center billing article) |
| Business (current official name for the former “Team” plan) | $25 per user/month, billed monthly | $20 per user/month, billed annually (price cut from $25/$30 effective April 2, 2026) | 2-user minimum | Same feature set as above — shared workspace, admin controls, usage analytics, budgeting/spend controls, SAML SSO + MFA, no training on business data by default | Small-to-midsize businesses needing team collaboration with security basics (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
| Enterprise | Custom pricing (contact sales) | Custom pricing, annual contracts | Reported ~150-seat minimum in practice, though not officially published | Expanded context window, data residency in 10 regions, 24/7 priority support with SLAs, custom legal terms, SCIM provisioning, enterprise key management (EKM), domain verification, role-based access control, custom data retention, volume discounts | Large enterprises needing compliance guarantees, dedicated support, and scale (OpenAI Business Pricing; reported seat ranges via Coworker.ai Enterprise Pricing Analysis) |
Pricing history note: ChatGPT Business (formerly
Team) cost $25/month (annual) and $30/month (monthly) prior to April 2,
2026, when OpenAI cut prices by $5 per seat across both billing cycles
(OpenAI
Help Center).
Free trial: OpenAI offers a free trial period for
new Business/Team workspaces through its self-serve signup flow (“Try
for free” call-to-action) (OpenAI Business
Pricing); ChatGPT Plus and Free tiers have no separate trial since
Free is permanently free and Plus is billed immediately upon signup.
Step 3: Core Setup & Key
Settings
- Set up your shared workspace and admin console. As
the account creator, you become the workspace admin by default. Use the
admin console to manage members, review usage, and configure billing in
one place (ChatGPT
Business). - Assign member roles. Configure admin vs. standard
member roles so only trusted people can manage billing, invite/remove
users, or change security settings, while everyone else gets standard
usage access (ChatGPT
Business). - Configure data controls. Confirm that your
workspace has training on business data turned off (this is the default
on Team/Business), and review data retention settings so your team’s
conversations align with your company’s compliance needs (ChatGPT Business
Pricing). - Turn on SAML SSO and MFA (if available on your identity
provider). This is included in the Team/Business plan and
significantly reduces account-takeover risk for a shared business
workspace (ChatGPT
Business Pricing). - Set up shared/custom GPTs for your team. Build at
least one custom GPT tailored to a recurring task (e.g., a
support-response drafter or meeting-notes summarizer) and share it with
the whole workspace so the value of Team over individual Plus accounts
is immediately visible (ChatGPT Business).
Step 4: Integrations to
Connect First
ChatGPT Business/Team supports 60+ app connectors that bring your
company’s tools and data directly into ChatGPT (ChatGPT Business).
Prioritize:
- Slack — lets your team pull context from and send
outputs to the channels they already use for daily communication (ChatGPT Business). - Google Drive — connects your team’s existing
documents and files so ChatGPT can reference and summarize them
directly, rather than requiring manual uploads each time (ChatGPT Business). - SharePoint / Microsoft 365 — for teams standardized
on Microsoft tools, this connector brings company documents and context
into ChatGPT the same way Drive does for Google-based teams (ChatGPT Business). - GitHub — useful for teams doing technical work,
enabling ChatGPT (and Codex within the same plan) to reason across code,
documents, and tools together (ChatGPT Business).
Step 5: Your First-Week
Checklist
Common ChatGPT Team Setup Mistakes to Avoid
- Signing up with only 1 seat in mind, then being surprised by
the 2-seat minimum. Budget for at least two licenses before you
start checkout (What
is ChatGPT Business?). - Defaulting to monthly billing indefinitely. At $25
vs. $20 per user/month, a 5-person team pays an extra $300/year by
staying on monthly billing longer than necessary (What
is ChatGPT Business?). - Not assigning an admin before inviting the whole
team. Without a clear admin role, no one manages billing,
security settings, or removes departing employees’ access. - Confusing ChatGPT Team/Business with the API.
ChatGPT Team/Business is a separate subscription from OpenAI’s API
platform — API usage is billed separately and isn’t included in your
per-seat price (What
is ChatGPT Business?). - Leaving connectors and custom GPTs unconfigured for
weeks. Teams that never connect Slack, Drive, or SharePoint
tend to use ChatGPT like a generic chatbot rather than a tool grounded
in their actual company knowledge, which is where most of
Team/Business’s value comes from (ChatGPT Business).
If your team eventually grows past roughly 150 seats or needs
advanced compliance features like SCIM provisioning, audit logs, or data
residency guarantees, that’s the point to evaluate ChatGPT Enterprise
rather than stretching Team/Business beyond its intended scope (ChatGPT Business
Pricing). For most small teams and startups just getting started,
though, Team/Business comfortably covers day-to-day needs without that
added cost and complexity.
Pricing Comparison:
ChatGPT Team vs Notion
| Feature | Notion | ChatGPT Team (Business) |
|---|---|---|
| Starting Price | $0 (Free); $10/user/month annual for Plus (Notion Pricing) | $0 (Free); $20/user/month annual for Business (2-seat minimum) (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
| Free Plan Available | Yes — full-featured Free plan for individuals, limited for multi-member workspaces (Notion Pricing) | Yes — Free tier with limited GPT-5.5 access, messages, and features (OpenAI ChatGPT Pricing) |
| Core Use Case | All-in-one workspace: docs, wikis, databases, project management, with AI layered in | Dedicated conversational AI assistant for teams: chat, research, coding (Codex), content generation |
| AI Features | Notion AI add-on ($8/user/month) or bundled in Business tier: Notion Agent, AI Meeting Notes, Enterprise Search, Q&A across workspace content (Notion Pricing; The Software Scout) | Core product is AI: GPT-5/5.6 models, Deep Research, Codex coding agent, image generation, Agent Mode — all included in the base seat price (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
| Collaboration Tools | Native docs, databases, comments, shared teamspaces, guest access, real-time multiplayer editing | Shared workspace, shared projects/GPTs, but limited document co-editing compared to Notion (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
| Ease of Use | Moderate learning curve — flexible block-based editor takes time to master | Low learning curve — familiar chat interface, minimal setup |
| Integrations | Basic/premium connections depending on tier (Slack, Google Drive, GitHub, etc. via connectors) (Notion Pricing) | 60+ app connectors including Slack, Google Drive, SharePoint, GitHub, Atlassian (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
| Customer Support | Standard support on paid plans; dedicated customer success manager on Enterprise (Notion Pricing) | Standard support on Business; 24/7 priority support with SLAs on Enterprise (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
| Free Trial Length | Free plan is permanent (not a time-limited trial); paid plans refundable within 3 days (monthly) or 30 days (annual) if you downgrade (Notion Pricing) | Free plan is permanent; Business plans offer a “try for free” self-serve trial before committing to paid seats (OpenAI Business Pricing) |
Verdict: Which Should You
Choose?
Here’s the honest truth: this isn’t really a Notion-vs-ChatGPT
decision — it’s a “which do I need first” decision, because these tools
solve different problems. Notion is your team’s home base for docs,
wikis, and projects, with AI baked in to help you write and search
faster. ChatGPT Team (now officially ChatGPT Business) is a
dedicated AI assistant built for deep reasoning, research, and coding,
with enterprise-grade privacy controls. If your team is drowning in
scattered docs and disorganized knowledge, start with Notion Plus or Business —
it’ll pay for itself in saved searching time alone. If your team is
already organized but needs serious AI horsepower for research, writing,
and coding, ChatGPT
Business at $20/user/month (annual) is the better first move,
especially since it now costs the same as an individual Plus seat.
Growing teams with real budgets, though, shouldn’t choose — run both
together. Use Notion as your workspace and ChatGPT as the AI engine that
powers it, and you’ll get the best of both worlds for around
$40/user/month combined.
Ready to get started? Get Started with ChatGPT Team
→
Completing your ChatGPT Team setup gives your business a secure, shared AI workspace with
admin controls, SSO, and a no-training-on-your-data guarantee — all
without the seat minimums and negotiated contracts required for
Enterprise, making it the practical starting point for most small and
growing teams.
