Facebook reportedly has a new Chat SDK for Messenger that it’s giving to a select few developers. The company hasn’t announced it or made documentation available.
According to Josh Constine at TechCrunch, the SDK enables developers to build “interactive experiences and ‘bots’” for shopping, travel, etc. He writes:
The Chat SDK allows developers to create bots that users can send text messages to directly and that automatically respond with information, images, location services, product prices, Buy buttons, and more. The Chat SDK can also tap into Messenger built-in payments system to let users make purchases via bots.
This is, of course, in addition to M, Messenger’s personal assistant.
Last month, Facebook announced a new feature for Messenger to let users request rides from Uber and potentially other services in another recent example of how Messenger is evolving into an all-around assistant app.
According to recent stats fro Nielsen, Messenger is the fastest growing of the top smartphone apps in the U.S., nearly catching up to YouTube, which holds the number 2 spot behind Facebook itself.
Facebook isn’t commenting on he SDK.
Image via Facebook