AI Chat Archive

AI Chat Archive is a Chrome extension that exports ChatGPT conversations to Markdown. It can create readable Q/A notes, full transcripts, organized folders, and best-effort attachment exports.

This README is the developer quick-start and the top-level documentation index. Full documentation lives in docs/.

Developer Quick Start For Chrome

1. Clone or download this repository.

2. Open Chrome.

3. Go to chrome://extensions/.

4. Turn on Developer mode.

5. Click Load unpacked.

6. Select this project folder:

   chrome-extention
   

7. Confirm that AI Chat Archive appears in the extension list.

8. Open a supported ChatGPT page:

   https://chatgpt.com/*
   https://chat.openai.com/*
   

9. Click the extension icon and run an export.

No build step is required. The extension is loaded directly from manifest.json, popup.html, popup.js, content.js, and assets/icons/.

Reload After Changes

When you edit extension files:

1. Go back to chrome://extensions/.
2. Find AI Chat Archive.
3. Click the reload icon.
4. Refresh the ChatGPT tab.
5. Test the popup again.

Reloading the extension updates the popup. Refreshing the ChatGPT tab ensures the content script is current.

Main Features

• Export current ChatGPT conversation as readable Markdown notes.
• Export full User/Assistant transcript as Markdown.
• Preserve code blocks with safe Markdown fences.
• Save to Chrome Downloads or a user-selected advanced folder.
• Organize exports by project, standalone chat, chat-title folder, or flat folder.
• Save accessible attachments and write an attachments.json manifest.
• Store popup preferences in Chrome local storage.

Documentation Index

• Docs home
• Developer Chrome guide
• Detailed requirements
• Detailed feature documentation
• Non-technical user guide
• Extension architecture
• Troubleshooting
• GitHub setup and metadata

Project Files

manifest.json             Chrome Manifest V3 configuration
popup.html                Extension popup UI and styles
popup.js                  Popup state, export flow, downloads, and folder writes
content.js                ChatGPT page inspection, Markdown conversion, attachments
assets/icons/             Extension icons and editable SVG source
assets/social/            GitHub social preview image source and PNG
docs/                     Product, developer, user, and support documentation

Current Support

The current implementation supports ChatGPT pages on chatgpt.com and chat.openai.com. The naming and folder model are designed so future AI chat platforms can be added later, but those platforms are not implemented yet.

Known Limits

• Project detection depends on ChatGPT page structure and can break when the site changes.
• The extension exports visible conversation content from the browser page.
• Some uploaded files are visible only as metadata and do not expose downloadable URLs.
• Advanced folder mode depends on browser support for the File System Access API.

License

Released under the MIT License.

Copyright (c) 2026 Vikram.