ChatGPT search partly relies on third-party search providers for its answers, and Bing is the one that both OpenAI and Microsoft mention by name. If Bing doesn't know your site, one of the main doors into ChatGPT stays shut. The good news: if you already use Google Search Console, connecting Bing Webmaster Tools, sitemap included, takes about ten minutes. IndexNow then makes sure Bing hears about new or updated pages right after the change, not at its next crawl.
Plenty of companies have had Search Console set up for years and have never once logged in to Bing Webmaster Tools, because "nobody uses Bing anyway". For classic search, that was a defensible position. For AI search, though, it's not about how many people open bing.com. It's about whose index the chatbots draw on.
- Microsoft announced in 2023 that Bing would become ChatGPT's default search experience. OpenAI now usually talks about "third-party search providers", but its enterprise help page names Bing explicitly.
- Bing isn't the only route: OpenAI runs its own search crawler (OAI-SearchBot), and you need to allow it in robots.txt.
- The setup is three steps: Search Console import (brings over verified sites and sitemaps), a sitemap check, and IndexNow.
- Since February 2026, Bing Webmaster Tools also has an AI Performance report on citations in Copilot and Bing's AI summaries. Don't expect ChatGPT figures from it.
- This gets you in the door. It doesn't guarantee citations: whether you get cited is still down to your content.
Does ChatGPT really use Bing's index?
Partly. It's worth being precise, because a lot of guides boil it down to "ChatGPT uses Bing". The public record is more nuanced:
- At Build in May 2023, Microsoft announced that Bing would become ChatGPT's default search experience.
- In its 2024 launch post, OpenAI said ChatGPT search draws on third-party search providers and on content supplied directly by its partners.
- The ChatGPT search help page explains that it rewrites your question into one or more targeted queries, sends them to search partners, and may follow up with more specific queries after reviewing the first results.
- Bing is named in the help page for Enterprise and Edu workspaces, which says ChatGPT may share approximate, IP-derived location with Bing and specialised data providers.
Meanwhile, OpenAI is building its own index too. According to its crawler documentation, OAI-SearchBot exists to surface websites in ChatGPT's search features. Sites that opt out of it won't be shown in ChatGPT search answers, though they can still appear as navigational links.
Our takeaway: Bing's index isn't the only source, but among the documented third-party providers it's the only one anyone names. If a page is in neither Bing nor OpenAI's own index, ChatGPT has nothing to cite. Of those two doors, Bing is the one you can open yourself most easily, and being in Bing also counts in Microsoft Copilot.
How do you connect Bing Webmaster Tools in 10 minutes?
This is the order we follow when we set up a client's site. Ten minutes is realistic if you have Search Console access and your shop or CMS supports IndexNow. On a custom-built system, IndexNow is a developer task, though a small one.
1. Import your site from Search Console (about 3 minutes)
Bing has been able to import from Google Search Console since 2019, and imported sites are verified automatically. The steps:
- Sign in to Bing Webmaster Tools, or create an account.
- On the My Sites page, click Import.
- Sign in with the Google account you use for Search Console and click Allow so Bing can see your verified sites and sitemaps.
- Pick the sites you want and click Import again.
No Search Console? Bing offers the same verification methods as Google: uploading an XML file, adding a meta tag, a DNS record, or a domain provider integration.
2. Check your sitemap (about 2 minutes)
The import brings your sitemaps across, but open the Sitemaps section to confirm they're actually there and that Bing processed them without errors. If the list is empty, use Submit sitemap and enter the sitemap's full URL.
While you're at it, look at the sitemap itself. We tend to see the same three problems for both search engines:
- redirected or 404 URLs left over from an old migration,
- noindexed or non-canonical pages (filter pages, parameterised URLs in a shop),
- no
Sitemap:line inrobots.txt.
We cover clean sitemaps in more detail in our technical SEO article.
3. Turn on IndexNow (about 5 minutes if your platform supports it)
IndexNow is an open protocol: when you add, update or delete a URL, you tell the search engine with a single HTTP request instead of waiting for the next crawl. Bing's four-step guide goes like this:
- Generate a key. Per the documentation it must be 8 to 128 characters long and may only contain letters, numbers and dashes.
- Host the key in a UTF-8 text file containing the key itself, for example at
https://example.com/a1b2c3d4e5f6.txt. - Submit changed URLs, one at a time or in bulk.
- Verify in Bing Webmaster Tools that they arrived.
A bulk submission looks like this:
POST /indexnow HTTP/1.1
Host: www.bing.com
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
{
"host": "example.com",
"key": "a1b2c3d4e5f6",
"keyLocation": "https://example.com/a1b2c3d4e5f6.txt",
"urlList": [
"https://example.com/products/new-product/",
"https://example.com/blog/fresh-post/"
]
}Participating search engines maintain a shared partner list and pass submissions on to each other, so notifying one is enough. Several popular CMSs and CDNs support IndexNow out of the box, and Bing's page lists them. On custom builds we hook it into the publishing event: when a product, article or page goes live, changes or is removed, the system submits the URL automatically.
There's no need to resubmit your whole sitemap every day. IndexNow is for changed URLs; the sitemap remains the full list.
4. Check robots.txt (1 minute)
Connecting Bing is pointless if robots.txt or an overzealous firewall locks the bots out. Make sure bingbot and OAI-SearchBot can reach your important pages. OpenAI says its search and training crawler settings are independent, so you can block GPTBot and still appear in ChatGPT search:
User-agent: OAI-SearchBot
Allow: /
User-agent: GPTBot
Disallow: /
Sitemap: https://example.com/sitemap.xmlAccording to OpenAI's documentation, its search systems take roughly 24 hours to adjust after a robots.txt change.
What should you watch in Bing Webmaster Tools in the first few weeks?
In the first days, watch two things: whether the URLs you sent via IndexNow arrived, and how many of your sitemap URLs made it into the index. If an important page is missing, look for the same culprits as with Google: noindex, canonical errors, weak internal linking, thin content.
The new piece is the AI Performance report, which Microsoft launched as a public preview in February 2026. Microsoft says it shows when your site is cited in answers from Microsoft Copilot, Bing's AI-generated summaries and select partner integrations, which URLs were referenced, and how citation activity changes over time.
One important caveat: Microsoft doesn't say this includes ChatGPT data, so don't read it as if it did. We use it as a compass. It shows which of your pages AI treats as citable, and which topics of yours it never references at all.
What doesn't connecting Bing fix?
Bing Webmaster Tools handles getting in, not getting picked. Being in the index only means ChatGPT can find you. Whether it cites you depends on whether your page has a specific, verifiable answer to what the user asked. We dug into this in our AI SEO piece analysing which sources Google's AI Overviews cite.
llms.txt doesn't replace any of this either. It's a nice-to-have at most, while being in Bing's index and letting OAI-SearchBot in are prerequisites. Our order is always the same: first make the site crawlable and indexed, then refine the content, and only then the extras.
Frequently asked questions
Is Bing Webmaster Tools worth it if almost everyone in my market uses Google?
Yes. With AI search, the number of people searching on bing.com is no longer the point. Bing is a documented search partner of ChatGPT, and Webmaster Tools shows your Copilot citations separately. Setup takes ten minutes and upkeep is mostly automatic.
Does IndexNow work for Google too?
Don't build on it for Google. There, sitemaps and Search Console are the established route. IndexNow is for search engines that have joined the protocol; you'll find the current list on indexnow.org.
If I block GPTBot, will I disappear from ChatGPT search?
No. According to OpenAI, the GPTBot (model training) and OAI-SearchBot (search) settings are independent. For search, OAI-SearchBot access is what counts.
How long until my site shows up in ChatGPT answers?
Nobody can give you an honest deadline, us included. IndexNow speeds up how quickly Bing learns about a change, but whether an answer cites you also depends on the question and on competing content.
Does Bing Webmaster Tools replace Google Search Console?
No, you run them side by side. Search Console is for Google; Bing Webmaster Tools covers Bing, Copilot and, indirectly, ChatGPT search. Thanks to the import, the second comes almost free with the first.
Not sure whether your site is in Bing or whether AI crawlers can see it? Our free SEO and AI visibility audit checks that too, and tells you what to do next.