Channels
Website widget
Customise the chat widget on your website and embed it with one line of HTML.
Every workspace comes with a chat widget for your own website. There's no account to sign in to and no token to paste. The widget exists as soon as your workspace does, and it's switched on by default. Customise how it looks, paste one line of HTML into your site, and your agent starts answering visitors.
The widget uses the same agent, knowledge and actions as your social channels. Its conversations go to the same inbox, and it counts toward the same AI reply allowance. It's included on every plan and never counts toward your messaging channel limit.
Open the widget settings
In the sidebar, click Channels. Your widget appears first, under Website, with a badge showing whether it's Active or Off. Click Customise.
The settings page has the controls on the left and a Live preview on the right. The preview shows exactly what visitors see and updates as you type. Nothing you type in the preview is sent to your agent.
When you've made changes, click Save changes. Until you do, the page shows Unsaved changes.
Appearance
- Display name. Shown in the widget header. Use the name your customers know you by. The default is "Support", and it can be up to 32 characters.
- Primary colour. Used for the header, the send button and the suggested questions. Pick one of the Presets, use the colour picker, or type a hex code such as
#4F46E5. - Launcher icon. The button in the corner of your site that visitors click to open the chat. Click Change to pick an icon or upload your own image.
- Agent avatar. Shown in the chat header and beside every reply. Pick an icon or upload your logo. If you leave it empty, the widget shows the first letter of your display name instead.
Uploaded images can be PNG, JPEG or WebP, up to 512KB.
Messages
- Welcome message. The first thing a visitor reads, up to 240 characters. It isn't sent to your agent, so it never counts against your plan.
- Footer message. Small print under the message box, up to 80 characters. Leave it empty to hide it.
- Suggested questions. Tappable badges above the message box. When a visitor taps one, it's sent as their message. You can add up to six, each up to 48 characters. Click Add suggestion to add one.
Use your suggested questions for what customers ask most, such as opening hours, order tracking, or "I'd like to talk to someone". They help visitors start a conversation.
Install the widget
Open the Install tab
On the widget settings page, click Install.
Copy the snippet
Under Embed on your site, click Copy snippet.
Paste it into your site
Paste the snippet just before the closing
</body>tag on every page where you want the widget. On most website builders, this goes in a "custom code" or "footer code" setting.Check your site
Reload your site. The launcher appears in the corner in your primary colour. Open it and send a test message.
The snippet is a single script tag. Yours contains your own widget ID, so always copy it from the Install tab. It looks like this:
<script src="https://orbitbase.io/widget.js" data-orbitbase="your-widget-id" async></script>The widget loads in the background, so it doesn't slow your page down. Your site's styles don't affect it.
What visitors experience
- Their conversation continues. The widget remembers the visitor's browser, so if they reload the page, their conversation is still there. This identifies a browser, not a person. If they clear their browser data, they start fresh.
- Conversations end after an hour of quiet. If there are no new messages for an hour, the visitor's next message starts a new conversation. Visitors can also start a new conversation at any time from the widget header.
- They can rate replies. A thumbs up and thumbs down sit under each agent reply. Your team sees the rating beside that message in the inbox, as Helpful or Not helpful.
- They're never left hanging. If a teammate has taken over or your agent is paused, the agent doesn't answer. Instead, the widget tells the visitor their message has been received and a person will reply. While the chat is open, your team's replies from the inbox appear automatically.
When a teammate is typing in the inbox, the visitor doesn't see a typing indicator. They see one only while the agent is answering.
Turn the widget off
Every workspace has exactly one website widget. You can switch it off, but you can't delete it.
On the Install tab, under Widget status, click Switch off. The widget stops answering on your site and removes itself from your pages, even where the snippet is still installed. Conversations already in your inbox are kept.
To bring it back, click Switch on. It picks up where it left off, and you don't need to reinstall the snippet.
Troubleshooting
The widget doesn't appear on my site
Check that the snippet is on the page, just before </body>, and that Widget status shows Widget is live. Some website builders only publish custom code after you republish the site.
I changed the colour but my site still shows the old one
Make sure you clicked Save changes. Then reload your site.
Anyone could copy my snippet
That's true. The widget can currently run on any site that includes your snippet, and you can't restrict it to your own domains yet. Messages sent through it still count toward your AI reply allowance.