Meta AI Could Get Its Own Standalone App Like ChatGPT

Meta AI could be finding a new home this year. The company is planning to release a standalone app for its generative AI chatbot sometime in the second quarter of 2025, according to CNBC, citing anonymous sources familiar with the matter.

Meta AI currently lives in its social media apps, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, and it’s available through the web. But it doesn’t have a standalone mobile or desktop apps, so creating one would be a big step forward for the company. It would also make Meta more competitive with OpenAI’s ChatGPT. You can download the ChatGPT desktop and mobile apps (iOS and Android), or you can use it through your web browser. 

As an aside: After news of Meta’s potential standalone app broke, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman reposted the story, writing, “ok fine maybe we’ll do a social app.”

Read more: Instagram May Spin Off Reels as a Standalone App, Report Says

A Meta AI app might be helpful for folks who use the program regularly. When I reviewed Meta AI, I noted that its presence in our social media apps is as convenient as it is annoying. Ideally, if there was a separate mobile app for Meta AI, the company could be inclined to remove some of the Meta AI clogging up our DMs and search/explore. The current setup on the web prompts you to log into your Facebook account. If the standalone app doesn’t require you to log in via Facebook, that might make it more accessible or appealing to use.

Meta declined to comment on the app’s development and release timeline.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg is one of many tech execs who feel AI is the future. And he has been putting his money where his mouth is; in the company’s latest earnings report, Meta said it will spend up to $65 billion on its generative AI and core business. 

But Meta’s journey in AI has been rocky. Initial reactions to Meta AI’s integration into its social apps were mixed, with many feeling it was an unwarranted or unnecessary addition. Meta created a number of AI Instagram profiles, which blew up when users like Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah posted about their conflicting, racist experiences chatting with them. Meta ultimately ended up scrubbing the accounts.

For more on Meta, check out what’s inside the new Meta Ray Ban smart glasses and what you need to know about Meta’s community notes program.