You are here because you want to know how to have ChatGPT write an essay for you, and I am saying that you should not just do that, but there are ways to have ChatGPT or other AI services help you with your paper. To be clear, ChatGPT can absolutely write a paper for you, but you have to be careful that it matches the specific instructions your professor gave you and that you don’t get in trouble for cheating. I won’t preach about how it is wrong to have AI write your essay and that it takes away your chance to learn, but I will warn you that there are pros and cons to doing it, and to avoid problems, you may have to put in some work.

If you’re short on time and really want the AI to write a full paper, it can. You enter the essay prompt into ChatGPT and provide clear instructions. However, ChatGPT can say no to certain requests. For example, I entered, “Write me a 1,500-word essay on the role of aqueducts in the success of ancient Rome as an empire using six external sources cited in MLA.” The AI declined, then told me it could write an outline and give me the six sources it had used for my own research. It did, which was helpful, but it didn’t write the full paper as requested.

I tried again, thinking that perhaps the aversion stemmed from my request for an essay: “Write 1,500 words on the role of aqueducts in the success of ancient Rome as an empire, using six outside sources cited in MLA.” The software told me this would be “too long,” and then repeated the summary and source suggestions from earlier.

Ultimately, I had success working in chunks. I asked for a 100-word introduction to an essay on the topic and if ChatGPT could tell me the sources for it. Sure enough, it gave me the introduction, plus the sources it used. You could theoretically work chunk by chunk and ask the AI to create an intro, paragraphs, and conclusion. You still have to add your citations manually, but it will give them to you.