How to add an AI chatbot to your WordPress site (without it making things up)

First, choose the right kind of chatbot

Most “how to add a chatbot” guides skip this, and it is the decision that matters most. There are three kinds of chatbot you can put on a WordPress site, and they differ in cost, in where your data goes, and in how accurate they are.

Hosted services are quick to start and often include live chat and other channels. Plugins with your own key are cheaper at volume and keep data on your site.

For a business website that wants accurate answers and leads, a plugin with your own AI key is usually the best value. The hosted services price their AI by usage: on 25 September 2026, Chatbase’s Hobby plan was $40 a month for 700 message credits and its Standard plan $150 a month for 4,000, while Tidio’s Lyro AI agent started at $32.50 a month for 50 AI conversations. With your own key, 1,000 questions usually cost a few dollars.

Step 1: Install a chatbot plugin

We use HolaReply in the screenshots because we make it and know it best, but the steps are the same for most AI chatbot plugins. In WordPress, go to Plugins → Add New, upload or search for the plugin, then click Install and Activate.

HolaReply is free on WordPress.org: search for HolaReply in Plugins → Add New Plugin, or download the zip and upload it.

Before you pick a plugin, check three things: that it answers only from your content, that it hands questions it can’t answer to a person, and that it loads after your page so it doesn’t slow your site down.

Step 2: Connect an AI provider key

The plugin needs an AI model to write its answers. With your own key, the provider bills you directly and nobody adds a margin per message. For Google Gemini:

1. Open Google AI Studio

   Go to aistudio.google.com/api-keys and sign in with a Google account.

2. Create an API key

   Click Create API key, choose or create a project, and copy the key. Keys created since May 2026 are Google’s newer “auth keys”, restricted to the Gemini API; older standard keys are being switched off, so create a new one if yours is old.

3. Paste it into the plugin

   In HolaReply this is Settings → AI connection (step by step in the docs). The key is stored encrypted and never shown again.

4. Turn on billing before you go live

   Click Set up billing next to your project and add at least $5 of prepaid credit. The free tier is fine for testing, but it has daily limits, Google may use free-tier prompts to improve its products, and Google’s terms require a paid key if your site serves visitors in the EU, UK or Switzerland. Turn on auto-reload: when prepaid credit runs out, requests stop.

Treat the key like a password: never paste it into a page, a public form or a support ticket.

Step 3: Teach it your content

An AI chatbot is only as good as what it reads. Choose the content types it should learn from: usually pages, posts and, on a shop, WooCommerce products. Index only published content; drafts and private pages have no place in a public chatbot.

Then fill the gaps. Most sites never write down the things customers ask most: delivery times, minimum orders, returns, opening hours. Add them to the knowledge base as short question-and-answer pairs.

The knowledge base: short answers for the questions your pages don’t cover.

Step 4: Stop it guessing

This is the step that separates a helpful assistant from a liability. An AI model left to itself will answer anything, confidently, including things that are wrong for your business. In 2024 a Canadian tribunal ordered Air Canada to honour a refund policy its website chatbot had invented, and rejected the airline’s argument that the chatbot was responsible for its own words (Moffatt v. Air Canada, 2024 BCCRT 149). Whatever your chatbot says, your business says. Four settings keep it honest:

• Answer only from sources. The assistant should answer from your content or not at all.
• Show the source. A link under each answer lets the visitor check it, and lets you see why it said what it said.
• Say “I don’t know”. When nothing covers the question, it should say so and offer a person, not improvise.
• Lock risky topics. Prices, quotes, contracts, allergens, medical questions: anything a mistake would make expensive should go straight to a person.

Step 5: Decide what happens when it can’t answer

A question the chatbot can’t answer is often your best lead: someone who wants something specific. Don’t let it end in a dead end.

• Offer a person, and ask for an email address at that moment, not before the chat starts. Asking everyone up front drives most visitors away.
• Never ask twice: if they already gave an address, use it.
• Send your team the whole conversation, so nobody asks the customer to repeat themselves.
• Make sure a lead still reaches you if the AI provider is down or out of credit.

Choose the moments the chat asks for an email: no answer, a locked topic, a request for a person, a buying question.

Step 6: Brand it and check your speed

Give the assistant a name, your logo and your accent colour, write a one-line greeting, and add three quick replies for the questions you hear most. Keep the greeting honest about what it is: an assistant that answers from your website.

Then check speed. A good chatbot loads after your page, so it doesn’t affect your Core Web Vitals. If you use a caching or optimisation plugin that delays JavaScript (WP Rocket, LiteSpeed Cache, WP-Optimize and others), and the chat button doesn’t appear, exclude the chatbot’s script from “delay JavaScript” and clear the cache.

Branding with a live preview: name, icon, colour, greeting and quick replies.

Step 7: Test it before visitors do

Open your site on your phone, in a private window, and ask the questions a real customer would. Use this checklist:

• A common question your pages answer: is the answer right, and is the source shown?
• A question in another language: does it reply in that language?
• A question your site doesn’t cover: does it say so and offer a person?
• A question on a locked topic, such as a price: does it go to your team instead?
• A question with nothing to do with you (“What is the capital of France?”): does it decline?
• Leave your email: does the enquiry arrive in your inbox with the whole conversation?
• Does the chat remember the conversation when you move to another page?

What an AI chatbot on WordPress really costs

With your own key there are two costs: the plugin licence, if you need a paid version, and AI usage. On Google Gemini Flash, 1,000 answers a month cost about $1.70 at Google’s prices today (measured on holareply.com); longer pages and answers cost more. A lighter model costs less. Every option side by side: how much an AI chatbot costs per month.

Hosted prices are from each service’s pricing page; credits and conversations are counted differently by each, so check against your own traffic.

Privacy and GDPR

A chatbot handles what visitors type, which often includes names and contact details. Before you go live:

• Know where conversations are stored: in your WordPress database, or on a service’s servers.
• Keep personal details away from the AI provider. HolaReply removes names, email addresses, phone numbers and company names before any question is sent.
• Mention the chatbot and the AI provider in your privacy policy.
• Delete old conversations on a schedule (HolaReply does this after 90 days by default), and know how you will answer a visitor who asks to see or delete their data.

If something goes wrong

The chat button doesn’t appear

Almost always a caching or “delay JavaScript” setting. Exclude the chatbot’s script from delay and minification, then clear the page cache and any CDN cache.

It answers “I don’t know” too often

The answer probably isn’t on your site in words the AI can find. Check that the page is published and indexed, and add a short entry to the knowledge base.

It stopped answering and mentions a quota

You have reached your AI provider’s free limit. Turn on billing with the provider. A good plugin still takes enquiries while the AI is unavailable.

Questions people ask

Sources

Checked on 25 September 2026. Prices and features change; tell us in the chat if something here is out of date and we will fix it.

1. Chatbase pricing
2. Tidio pricing
3. Google AI Studio: API keys
4. Gemini API: using API keys (auth keys)
5. Gemini API Additional Terms of Service (free vs paid, EEA/UK/CH)
6. Moffatt v. Air Canada, 2024 BCCRT 149: summary by the American Bar Association

Maqsood R.

Founder of HolaReply. He builds AI assistants that answer only from a business’s own website, and checks every fact in these guides against the products’ own pages.

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