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OpenRouter Free Chatbot Next.js streaming AI template interface
AI Chatbot Template

OpenRouter Free Chatbot

OpenRouter Free Chatbot is a focused Next.js AI chatbot template for builders who want to prototype with OpenRouter's free model router. It includes token-by-token streaming, stop generation, starter prompts, an internal scrolling chat transcript, a mobile responsive composer, and a secure server-side API route. Use it for assistant demos, AI SaaS experiments, internal tools, or marketplace-ready chatbot products without hard-coding a single provider model.

Direct answer

OpenRouter Free Chatbot is a Next.js RAG chatbot template for document Q&A, OpenAI embeddings, retrieval augmented generation, and AI chatbot answers with citations. It is best for knowledge-base assistants, support documentation bots, document intelligence apps, and internal research copilots.

Download on GitHub View repository Explore AI Lab
OpenRouter Free Models OpenRouter Docs

Features

Streaming text chat
OpenRouter free model router
Server-side API route
Responsive mobile interface
Internal chat transcript scrolling
Stop generation control

Use cases

AI assistant SaaSOpenRouter chatbot demoFounder prototypeInternal company chatbotFree model AI experimentation

Freshness and tested metadata

last Tested
Jul 12, 2026
last Updated
Jul 12, 2026
next Version
Next.js 16.2.1
node Version
Node.js 20+
runtime
Next.js App Router
deployment
Vercel-ready starter
license
MIT
status
Open Source

Architecture

Next.js App Router page for the user-facing interface.
React components for the responsive chat, workflow, or document interaction surface.
Server-side route for AI provider calls so credentials stay outside the browser.
Tailwind CSS styling for a mobile-ready interface.
Retrieval layer for chunking, embeddings, evidence selection, and cited answer generation.
Agent workflow layer for prompt transformation, research, handoffs, and inspectable intermediate outputs.
Realtime session layer for WebRTC audio, ephemeral client secrets, live transcript rendering, and interruption handling.
OpenRouter SDK integration for multi-model routing, streaming responses, and model-specific experimentation.

Setup path

  1. 1Clone the GitHub repository linked above.
  2. 2Install dependencies with npm install.
  3. 3Create a local environment file from the example variables.
  4. 4Add the required AI provider API key on the server side.
  5. 5Run the local Next.js development server and test the primary workflow.

Related AI template categories

Next.js AI chatbot templates RAG chatbot templates for Next.js OpenAI Agents SDK templates Voice AI agent templates OpenRouter chatbot templates Next.js OpenAI templates ChatGPT clone templates Document Q&A AI templates

Internal template pathways

AI Templates GPT OSS Chatbot ChatGPT Clone RAG Chatbot

Frequently asked questions

What is OpenRouter Free Chatbot?

OpenRouter Free Chatbot is a Next.js RAG chatbot template for document Q&A, OpenAI embeddings, retrieval augmented generation, and AI chatbot answers with citations. It is best for knowledge-base assistants, support documentation bots, document intelligence apps, and internal research copilots.

Who should use OpenRouter Free Chatbot?

Use OpenRouter Free Chatbot if you are a Next.js developer, AI product builder, applied AI engineer, or founder looking for an open-source AI app starter instead of rebuilding the same AI interface and server route from scratch.

Is OpenRouter Free Chatbot production-ready?

This starter is production-grade in its AI safety baseline: prompts are hardened against prompt-injection attempts, provider calls stay server-side, unsafe inputs are constrained, and client-facing errors are kept safe. You should still expand it for your use case by adding or adapting authentication, tenant isolation, persistent storage, observability, quotas, billing, and business-specific policy checks before a real launch.