OpenAI Turns ChatGPT Into an App Store Challenger

OpenAI announced a set of features at Dev Day on Tuesday that, taken together, turn ChatGPT into a place where software is discovered, launched, and used — by people and by AI agents alike. The direct target is the traditional app store model that Apple and Google have dominated for over a decade.

The event's headlines may have been the new agentic assistants called Dots and fresh AI models, but the bigger story is structural. OpenAI is building the discovery, distribution, interface, and identity layers of a new software economy inside a chatbot the company says now has 1.2 billion weekly users.

Apps surface inside the conversation

ChatGPT will begin suggesting apps in the flow of conversation when it recognizes that a particular app could help the user complete a task. The user can then connect the app and start using it directly within ChatGPT — no separate download, no native app, no web redirect.

An expanded plugin architecture makes this possible. It now supports extensions, which let developers build interactive panels where users work with their tools while chatting with ChatGPT. Apps and services that previously lived on the web or in desktop and mobile apps effectively become features of the chat interface itself.

This is not OpenAI's first experiment with apps inside the chatbot, but the current vision is more fleshed out than before. Developers who sign on can build AI-native versions of their apps through ChatGPT the same way they would through the open web or a mobile app store. As more discovery happens through AI chat, that becomes a distribution channel developers can hardly refuse.

In a Dev Day demo, OpenAI showed its own new meeting app running inside ChatGPT, pulling upcoming meetings from the user's calendar. The user could have AI take meeting notes, then receive a summary of follow-up items when the meeting ended. In another example, users worked with design-focused apps from Figma and Adobe to revise projects or use features that would otherwise have required a standalone application.

These apps can be shared through the lightweight websites ChatGPT now produces. Coworkers visiting a ChatGPT site sign in with their own credentials and permissions, so the software experience stays personalized to each user.

An identity layer, and a wallet that travels

OpenAI is also letting people carry their ChatGPT identity with them. "Sign in with ChatGPT" allows users to log into third-party apps while bringing their existing AI allowance along. Sixteen launch partners have signed on, including Cognition's Devin, Notion, Vercel, T3, OpenClaw, and Dactyl, and OpenAI says more are coming.

That identity-and-allowance pairing is significant. It replicates, in miniature, what Apple offers with "Sign in with Apple" plus in-app purchasing power — one account that authenticates you and carries spendable capacity across an ecosystem of third-party software.

On the developer operations side, OpenAI improved its plugin review process, its analogue to Apple's App Review. Developers can now track their review status, see what needs fixing, request a human review, and update their plugin's tools without restarting the entire submission.

The company also announced a new enterprise app marketplace where partners market their services. More than 30 partners offer apps through the OpenAI Marketplace at launch, including Adobe, Figma, Sierra, Decagon, HubSpot, Salesforce, ServiceNow, Harvey, Legora, Palo Alto Networks, CrowdStrike, and Baseten. Eligible customers can apply part of their OpenAI commitment toward approved partner software.

Dots shift the discovery decision to the agent

The agent layer pushes the model further. With the launch of Dots, OpenAI's autonomous agents will navigate the web and execute tasks in their own cloud infrastructure. Each Dot has its own cloud computer and browser and can use connected apps.

The contrast with the old model is stark. A user who wanted to build a website or coordinate a meeting calendar previously had to download different apps to a computer or phone. Now the user tells an AI agent what needs doing, and the agent does it. When the work requires another AI model or a specific application, the agent brings that tool to the user rather than the user hunting for it.

OpenAI says the Dots can connect to an ecosystem of now over 4,000 apps. The agents can also be proactive — jumping in to help with a project or bug, or handling a task the user forgot — though always with the user's approval. OpenAI says the Dots will perform what it calls "proactive research" in the background using connected apps in read-only mode, while users keep control over the actions the agents take.

For app makers, this opens a customer-acquisition route outside Apple and Google's stores. A user could subscribe to a service on the developer's own website, then connect that account to ChatGPT or Codex for the agent to use. OpenAI has not said these features eliminate the need for separate third-party subscriptions or other charges.

What's missing: the money layer

The one major piece OpenAI did not build on Tuesday is billing. The company announced no revenue-sharing or payment system comparable to the economic layer of traditional app stores, and it did not tease any plans on that front. Its announcements cover discovery, distribution, the interface, an identity layer, and a mechanism for sharing a user's existing ChatGPT AI allowance — everything except the cut.

That omission defines the next phase of the contest. If OpenAI eventually attaches commerce to this stack, developers will face a genuine second storefront with a 1.2-billion-user weekly audience; until then, the company is betting that being where discovery happens is leverage enough.