Also searched as a WordPress chat widget, chat app, live chat plugin or AI chatbot — same tool, one five-minute install.
SmartWidget loads asynchronously on WordPress with a Shadow DOM that isolates its styling. Lighthouse scores unaffected. CLS at zero. The snippet goes into theme footer (footer.php) or via Insert Headers and Footers plugin and the widget is live the moment the page saves. From £19 a month, UK built.
SmartWidget is an AI chat widget for WordPress sites. It installs via a single line of JavaScript pasted into theme footer (footer.php) or via Insert Headers and Footers plugin, reads your existing WordPress site automatically to build its knowledge base, and answers visitor questions in under eight seconds. No plugin to install on WordPress, no theme modification beyond pasting the snippet, no engineer required. The widget is configured per business — your services, your prices, your tone of voice — all learned from your site during setup. From £19 a month.
The full install end-to-end. Five steps, about five minutes from signup to the first answered visitor.
This is the one that catches people out, and it is the single most common reason a correctly-pasted snippet does not appear. WP Rocket, LiteSpeed Cache, W3 Total Cache and Autoptimize all offer JavaScript minification, combination and deferral. If the SmartWidget snippet gets swept into a combined bundle or deferred past page load, the chat bubble never renders. Because caching is applied per page, it often works on one page and silently fails on another, which makes it look like an intermittent fault rather than a config problem.
Add smartwidget to the JavaScript exclusion list in whichever optimiser you run, then purge the cache before testing:
If you paste the snippet straight into your active theme's footer.php, the next theme update overwrites the file and the widget disappears with no warning and no error. Use a child theme, or skip file editing entirely and hook it in from your child theme's functions.php:
add_action('wp_footer', function () {
echo '<script src="https://smartwidget.co.uk/w.js" data-key="YOUR_KEY" async></script>';
});WPCode and Insert Headers and Footers both do the same job through the admin UI if you would rather not touch a file. Any of these three routes survives theme and core updates.
Complianz, CookieYes and Borlabs Cookie block third-party scripts until the visitor consents. Register SmartWidget under Marketing or Functional depending on how your notice is configured, and the widget initialises only after acceptance. If you skip that step some consent plugins block the snippet outright and the widget never loads at all — another failure that looks like a broken install but is not.
On a Multisite network each subsite needs its own widget key, because the AI builds a separate knowledge base per site. Add the snippet per-site rather than network-wide, and manage all of them from a single dashboard on the Growth tier upwards.
WordPress covers several different setups and the install differs slightly in each. This page covers self-hosted WordPress.org sites. If yours is one of the following, the dedicated guide has the exact menu path:
If you are on a standard self-hosted WordPress site with any other theme, the steps above are all you need.
The exact panel and field to paste the snippet on every supported platform. WordPress is highlighted first.
The dashboard reviews and refines what the AI learned from your WordPress site. Every Q&A pair the AI generated is shown with a confidence score. High-confidence answers are auto-approved; lower-confidence ones are flagged for review. You can override any answer, add your own Q&A pairs, and define edge-case rules. The dashboard is structured so a non-technical WordPress site owner can confidently approve the AI's understanding of their business in ten to fifteen minutes.
On WordPress sites, a single line of JavaScript can change the conversion economics of the whole site. The widget runs 24/7, costs £19 a month, never sleeps, and handles unlimited concurrent conversations. Compared to a human chat operator at £2,000 a month and 8 hours a day, the maths makes itself. Install on WordPress in five minutes from theme footer (footer.php) or via Insert Headers and Footers plugin.
From this dashboard you can supervise every AI conversation on your WordPress site, jump into any one with a single click, and intervene before the AI says something you would not. The Live tab shows in-flight conversations. The Awaiting Human tab shows escalations. The Completed tab shows the archive. The Pinned tab shows the conversations you have flagged for follow-up. The visitor sees one continuous chat thread regardless of whether AI or human is replying.
A live chat app on WordPress needs a human at the other end. A chatbot answers on its own. SmartWidget is a chatbot in the sense that matters — it reads your WordPress site during signup and answers questions about your services, pricing and availability with nobody watching the inbox — but it is not a decision-tree bot with fixed buttons. It reads the question and answers it.
Most WordPress owners switch because live chat software costs more per month and only works during office hours. The chatbot answers at 11pm on a Sunday and emails you the enquiries that need a person.
Caching and optimisation plugins combine, minify or defer JavaScript, which breaks the snippet. Add smartwidget to the JavaScript exclusion list — WP Rocket under File Optimization, LiteSpeed under JS Excludes, W3 Total Cache under Minify, Autoptimize under JS Options — then purge the cache and reload.
Not in your parent theme's footer.php. Use the wp_footer action hook in a child theme's functions.php, or a code-injection plugin such as WPCode or Insert Headers and Footers. All three survive theme and core updates.
Yes. Each subsite needs its own widget key because the AI builds a separate knowledge base per site, so add the snippet per-site rather than network-wide. All sites are managed from one dashboard on the Growth tier and above.
Not for SmartWidget itself — there is no SmartWidget plugin to install, activate or keep updated. It is one script tag. You can add it through the wp_footer hook in a child theme with no plugin at all, or, if you would rather not touch code, paste it into a code-injection plugin such as WPCode or Insert Headers and Footers. Either way SmartWidget adds nothing to your plugin list, so there is no dependency to break on the next WordPress core update.
A single script tag with your unique widget key. Around 200 characters total. You copy it from the SmartWidget dashboard after signup, paste it into theme footer (footer.php) or via Insert Headers and Footers plugin, and save. The script tag loads our widget client asynchronously when a visitor lands on your page.
No. The widget loads asynchronously after the page has rendered, so it does not block any of your WordPress site's critical rendering path. PageSpeed and Lighthouse scores are unaffected. The widget bundle is under 30 KB and lazy-loads its UI when the visitor first interacts with the chat bubble.
SmartWidget is UK GDPR compliant by design. Conversation transcripts are encrypted at rest in UK-based data centres. The widget includes a configurable consent notice that integrates with most WordPress cookie banner solutions, and the dashboard exposes the controls needed for data-subject access and deletion requests.
Yes. The widget appearance is fully customisable from the SmartWidget dashboard — primary colour, accent colour, chat bubble position (bottom-left, bottom-right), avatar, welcome message, and trigger behaviour. The customisation is centralised, so changing it once updates the widget on your WordPress site immediately.
Remove the single line of JavaScript from theme footer (footer.php) or via Insert Headers and Footers plugin and save. The widget disappears immediately. There is nothing else to uninstall from WordPress — no database tables, no orphaned files, no leftover configuration.
Yes. Multi-site is built in from the Growth tier. One SmartWidget subscription can run widgets across multiple WordPress sites, each with its own AI personality, knowledge base and unified inbox. Particularly useful for agencies running client WordPress sites or operators with multiple brand sites.
Yes. The widget is responsive by default and works on every WordPress mobile breakpoint. The chat bubble sits in the bottom corner on every screen size and the chat interface adapts to mobile-optimised layout when a visitor opens it on a phone.
Yes. The widget integrates with Google Calendar, Outlook (Microsoft Graph), and the built-in SmartWidget scheduler. Visitors browsing your WordPress site can be offered specific appointment slots and book directly inside the chat. The event writes back to your calendar with the conversation transcript attached.
A small number of WordPress entry-level tiers restrict custom code. In that case, upgrading to a tier that allows custom JavaScript is the only path. If WordPress does not allow custom code on any tier, SmartWidget cannot be installed — but this is rare. Almost every modern WordPress Business or Pro plan supports it.
No. SmartWidget operates on monthly billing with no contract and no minimum commitment. Cancel any time directly from the dashboard with no notice period and no exit fee. The lowest tier is £19 per month, billed monthly, so the maximum risk on the decision is a single month's spend.
Live chat support inside the SmartWidget dashboard answers within minutes. The dashboard also contains a step-by-step WordPress-specific install guide with screenshots and the exact menu paths. If the install does not work, support will remote into a screenshare and complete it with you.
The widget includes a configurable consent notice that integrates with the major UK cookie banner solutions including OneTrust, Cookiebot, CookieYes, Iubenda, and the platform-native banners on WordPress where available. Consent state is respected — the widget does not initialise until consent has been granted on visitors in scope of UK GDPR.
The AI knowledge base is built from publicly accessible pages on your WordPress site. Content gated behind login is not included automatically. If your WordPress site has paid-content or member-only sections, the AI's knowledge will reflect only the public pages — which is typically what you want for visitor chat anyway.
4.9 out of 5 from 199 reviews. A selection of install-experience reviews from real UK businesses.
I am the worst kind of non-technical user — I built my Squarespace site myself and was scared of the code injection field. The widget walkthrough showed me exactly which menu to open. I am live and capturing bookings.
My ConvertKit landing page was meant to be a temporary holding page that ended up running for two years. SmartWidget installed via the tracking code field and is now my main lead capture.
We run a Sitecore site for our manufacturing business. The IT team flagged compatibility concerns. SmartWidget installed as a layout-level script tag and passed the internal security review without modification.
My Bubble app site needed chat without breaking the app routing. SmartWidget installed as a body script in the Bubble SEO settings and works across every page of the app without intercepting any of the existing routing logic.
I work mainly in Webflow and I have tested every chat widget on the market for client sites. SmartWidget is the only one that does not introduce CLS issues. Clean install, perfect Lighthouse score.
My Shopify theme is custom and locked down. SmartWidget installs via theme.liquid before the body close — exactly where every other tracking pixel goes. Zero conflicts with my checkout.
SmartWidget installs cleanly on every major platform in this category. Explore install guides for related platforms.
Sign up, paste the snippet, save. From £19 a month, no contract.
