Often while chatting with chatGPT, new topics or ideas come up that could be interesting yet we want to stay focused on the original topic! and so sometimes we want to explore more about those new topics/ideas in a different discussion to avoid mixing the conversations.
The way I understood how chat GPT works is that the more relevant the discussion is to the main topic the better, so new topics or ideas coming out from the original discussion should be “Forked” into another chat window to have more relevant discussion.
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Hi!
This is already possible, with a little workaround:
When you get to the point where you want to fork the conversation you ask the model to create a summary of the previous conversation with a specific focus on how you arrived at the new idea. Make sure to be as specific as needed and that all important facts and details are included.
Then you copy and paste the summary into a new conversation.
In the original conversation you use the option to rewrite a request. So, instead of continuing with the original conversation you rewrite the request with the summary to follow up on what you want to focus on. Then you will have a new branch in the conversation, which is actually the main branch.
When you later return to the original conversation the UI will automatically load the main branch. The request to write the summary is still there but it will be hidden and outside the context window, so the conversation remains focused on what’s important to you.
I understand that your request is a quality of life improvement but maybe this can help you today until we get such a feature you requested.
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Thank you for your help 
I will use this workaround going forward
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Hi, I’m looking for an update on this topic.
@astroveny - How has the workaround been serving you? If you’ve had some access, could you detail a general work flow that is working for you?
Have there been any new developments around a QOL feature for this since the last post?
I would like to conversation forking introduced as a native ChatGPT feature as well. So far, the closest option I have seen is a third-part product named Grafychat that works through the OpenAI APIs (and others).
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Bump. Wish there was an easy way to fork a conversation without adding a summary to the existing chat.
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It is actually already possible but the UX is a nightmare.
Basically you can fork at the chat level changing the message and adding a new lineage.
The problem is navigating, you should go back to the prompt and change 1>2>3 etc and follow the new line, but you have to remember where and why you forked. A new chat with the previous context would help.
I don’t think it’s very good at that. It puts a heavy emphasis on what was just being said on the topic and not so much on the fundamental facts starting out.
For example, say you ask it to write a contract. You lay down the background, upload some documents and paste in some text. Then you start picking a part the suggested contract. Slowly you iterate away from the main task, maybe addressing a new paper.
Now, Lets say you want to create another document regarding the same topic. (It might be an email or something). But you don’t want to derail the current discussion and instead branch out in a new thread. When you ask ChatGPT to sum up it will probably miss a lot of the “hard facts” going into the chat and put stronger emphasis on what was said later.
I would be happy if it possible to branch out earlier.
T
I used the AI itself to enter this discussion into ChatGPT and asked it to generate a prompt that would address this and our concerns. I worked it until it provided this suggestion below, which I haven’t tried yet, but you might want to give it a go.
“This topic has led to a related but distinct discussion. A new subtopic has come up—can you help me create a concise summary of the key points we’ve covered so far, including any foundational facts and background details? I’d like to move that summary into a new chat so we can explore this subtopic separately while continuing the original discussion here. Could you also flag any other significant ideas that might arise in our main conversation, so we can ‘fork’ those if needed? This way, we can keep both chats focused and maintain important context across them.”
I would love the feature! i had also asked ChatGPT to fork it for me but didnt work
This feature would be great.
bump. amazing idea, it would make question and side queries easier without losing focus of the main topic. a good example would be when you want to use it to study notes and you have a question but dont want to distract it by going off topic
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Exactly! That was one of the use cases I experienced
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bump! would love this feature
Have been doing this for a long time by rewriting messages, but I lose my old context. Especially with the addition of Projects now, it would be so great to have distinct chats that explore different “branches” of the same root context - all bundled into a folder I can go back to whenever required.