OpenAI's response to Meta's standalone AI app is a new social media app

Meta is planning on releasing a standalone AI app, which is part of company CEO Mark Zuckerberg's plan to put Meta at the forefront of the AI industry.

A new report citing people familiar with the matter states Meta will release the standalone AI app, which would be similar to OpenAI's ChatGPT, or DeepSeek, during the second quarter of this year. Notably, Meta released the Meta AI chatbot in September 2023, but then, in the following April, it was brought to the center of Meta's suite of apps as it was integrated into the search feature for Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger.

However, users are only able to access Meta AI through these apps and the dedicated website, but that is about to change as people familiar with the confidential project say Meta is planning on releasing a standalone app that will compete directly with ChatGPT/Perplexity, and other standalone AI apps. According to the people familiar with the project, Meta believes its users could interact with the AI-powered digital assistant more deeply if it provided a standalone app.

As for the competition, OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, has caught wind of Meta planning to release a direct competitor, with the company CEO Sam Altman taking to X to tease that in response to Meta's standalone app, OpenAI might release its own social app.