By: Nick Gambino
OpenAI just made a huge announcement – users can now chat with third-party apps directly inside ChatGPT. The company introduced this new feature at the DevDay event.
“Apps in ChatGPT fit naturally into conversation,” a ChatGPT article discussing the new apps integration reads. “You can discover them when ChatGPT suggests one at the right time, or by calling them by name.”
And that right there is really the beauty of it – you are harnessing the ease of ChatGPT’s conversational search to get better results from these third-party apps.
If you’re curious about music you can ask for a playlist from Spotify. The third-party app will kick in and deliver on your request. The same goes for Zillow. If you’re researching homes for rent or buy, you can get Zillow results right in your ChatGPT conversation.
Of course, this will require you to log in to the external app the first time you use it in ChatGPT. Once you do that you’ll either call up the app when you need it or ChatGPT will prompt you to use it when it seems relevant.
The apps currently available in this new rollout are Spotify, Zillow, Canva, Coursera and Figma. But that’s just the beginning. OpenAI says we’ll be getting AllTrails, Target, Uber, Khan Academy, Instacart, Peloton, TheFork, TripAdvisor, Thumbtack, DoorDash and OpenTable in the next few weeks.
They are only releasing specific big-name apps right now, but they’ve stated that the plan is to open it up to app submissions from developers later this year. In the meantime these developers can begin building these ChatGPT specific apps and testing them in the Apps SDK preview.
If this proves successful, and something tells me it will be, OpenAI will continue to expand third-party app integration. They already plan to introduce apps to ChatGPT Business, Enterprise and Edu in the next couple months, making it easier for users to automate tasks with ChatGPT.
