ResearchGPT: Chat with Research Papers Using AI
ResearchGPT lets you have real conversations with academic papers, using AI to answer your questions with cited sources and page numbers.
Overview
ResearchGPT is a FastAPI-powered tool built for anyone drowning in dense academic literature. Instead of manually skimming through pages of a research paper, you simply upload a PDF or paste a link to one hosted online, and the app takes care of the rest. Behind the scenes, it extracts the full text, converts it into embeddings, and leverages the OpenAI API to let you ask natural-language questions directly about the paper's content.
What sets ResearchGPT apart is its emphasis on traceability. Every answer it generates comes paired with the exact source text and page number it was pulled from, so you're never left wondering whether the AI is making things up. This makes it a practical, trustworthy companion for digesting complex papers quickly, whether you're prepping for a literature review, studying for exams, or just trying to figure out if a paper is relevant to your work.
As a self-hosted, developer-oriented project, it requires a bit of technical setup (an OpenAI API key and a local Redis instance), but in exchange you get full control over your data and workflow rather than relying on a third-party SaaS product.
Capabilities & Features
- LLM
- Research assistant
- PDF processing
- Question answering
- OpenAI API
- Embeddings
Core Features
- Automatic PDF text extraction
- Embedding generation for semantic search
- AI-powered question answering via OpenAI API
- Source text and page number citations for every answer
- Support for both uploaded files and online PDF links
Use Cases
- Quickly grasping the key findings of a dense research paper
- Locating specific data points or arguments buried in long documents
- Summarizing individual sections or chapters on demand
- Verifying claims by tracing answers back to exact page references
- Speeding up literature reviews across multiple papers
Best For
- Researchers
- Graduate and undergraduate students
- Academics and professors
- Analysts who work with technical reports
- Anyone needing fast comprehension of dense PDFs
Pros
- •Provides transparent source and page citations for every answer, reducing hallucination risk
- •Works with both local file uploads and online PDF links for flexibility
- •Self-hosted setup gives users full control over their data
- •Uses embeddings for more accurate, context-aware responses
- •Open-source nature allows for customization and inspection of the codebase
Cons
- •Requires manual setup including Redis and an OpenAI API key, which may be a barrier for non-technical users
- •Dependent on OpenAI API usage, which can incur ongoing costs
- •No built-in graphical interface details mentioned, likely requiring API or basic UI interaction
- •Performance and accuracy tied to the quality of PDF text extraction, which can struggle with scanned or poorly formatted documents
How to Use
1. Clone the ResearchGPT repository and install dependencies via `pip install -r requirements.txt`.
2. Install and run Redis locally to store embeddings.
3. Add your OpenAI API key to the application configuration.
4. Launch the FastAPI app and either upload a PDF file or paste a link to an online PDF.
5. Wait for the app to extract text and generate embeddings from the document.
6. Ask questions about the paper in natural language and receive answers with cited source text and page numbers.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Pricing
ResearchGPT itself is a free, self-hosted open-source tool, though users must supply their own OpenAI API key, meaning actual usage costs depend on OpenAI's API pricing.
Pricing data is provided as a summary. Visit the vendor website for full tier details.