Meta quietly launches Forum, a Reddit-like app that brings Facebook Groups and AI together

Meta quietly launches a new Reddit-like app called Forum | TechCrunch

Meta has quietly released a new standalone app for Facebook Groups, called "Forum." The company seems to be positioning Forum as a platform that functions similarly to Reddit, describing the app as a "dedicated space built for deeper discussions, real answers and communities you care about." The app appears to have been first spotted by social media consultant Matt Navarra. After you sign in with your Facebook account, Forum will load in your groups, profile and activity, and let you make posts with a nickname, just like on the standard Facebook app. Meta noted that your groups still exist on Facebook, and anything you share on Forum will be visible in your groups on Facebook. Meta says Forum's feeds are centered on conversations within groups, allowing users to see "what real people are saying, not just what's trending," and making it easy to pick up where they left off. The app includes an AI-powered "Ask" tab that lets users ask questions and receive answers compiled from discussions across different groups. There's also an admin AI assistant to help administrators manage groups and moderate content. This isn't the first time Meta has launched a standalone app for groups. Back in 2014, the company rolled out a dedicated Groups app that aimed to make it easier for users to share content across groups, but that effort was shuttered in 2017. Forum is one of two new apps from Meta in recent weeks. Last month, the social media company rolled out a new app called Instants that lets users share disappearing photos with Instagram friends. Instants and Forum come amid a broader effort at Meta to release more apps. The Wall Street Journal reported a few weeks ago that CEO Mark Zuckerberg told employees that with AI-driven efficiencies allowing the company to build more apps, the social media giant now aims to roll out many more apps than it has historically. Referring to Meta's chief product office Chris Cox, Zuckerberg reportedly said, "So Chris and I have been talking about 'all right, well can we build 50 new apps?' Like, yeah probably. But we probably should start by doing a few before we just, like, ramp up trying to do 50 all at once." Meta might think consumers want more apps, but that's likely not the case, especially when its new apps mostly end up being copies of other popular services. Instants, for example, borrows ideas from BeReal and Snapchat, while Meta Edits, launched last year, is largely a copy of ByteDance's CapCut. Meta did not immediately return a request for comment.

Forum is Meta's Dedicated App for Bringing Your Facebook Groups Together in One Feed

Alex Valdes from Bellevue, Washington has been pumping content into the Internet river for quite a while, including stints at MSNBC.com, MSN, Bing, MoneyTalksNews, Tipico and more. He admits to being somewhat fascinated by the Cambridge coffee webcam back in the Roaring '90s. "Built for the groups you already love." That's what Meta is promising with Forum, a new app from the company, which it quietly launched on Friday. Only available on iPhones for now, the app brings together all of your Facebook groups into a single feed. It works like this: assuming you belong to several Facebook groups, Forum brings together posts from those groups, surfacing them in your feed without any algorithmic recommendations or posts from friends. If you make a post to a group in your Forum feed, that post will appear in that group feed, and vice-versa. The app also has an AI feature called Ask, accessed by a button to the right of the home page button at the horizontal menu at bottom. With Ask, you can search for something across all your groups instead of having to scroll around each one to find it. "Your feed is built around conversations from groups," says Meta in the App Store listing. "See what real people are saying, not just what's trending, and easily jump back in where you left off." To get Forum, download it from the App Store on your iPhone. The app will then ask which Facebook account you want to connect with, and "your groups, profile and activity carry over," Meta says in the listing. Perhaps oddly, Meta did not announce Forum on either its newsroom page or on its X account. Social media consultant Matt Navarra spotted that the app had launched and posted about it on Threads, saying the Forum appears very similar to Reddit, with its emphasis on "real people" in the Forum feed. A spokesperson told CNET only: "We test lots of new products publicly to see what people find interesting and useful to their experiences across our apps." I tried Forum out for myself -- first, downloading the app from the App Store on my iPhone and then opening the app. I connected using my Facebook account, and then Forum integrated all of my groups -- my regular FB feed, Marketplace, a Buy Nothing group, etc. In the app's settings, you're able to manage your current groups, discover new ones or create a new one from scratch. At the top of the feed, Forum gave me some pointers to get started: I checked out my Forum feed. There were posts about the 49ers and Warriors (my favorite teams), items for sale, posts from friends on my regular Facebook. It took a bit of time to re-orient myself to having all those groups clustered together in one feed, but it did cut out a lot of extraneous posts that I didn't want or need.

Meta's Forum is part Reddit, part Facebook, and part Google AI Overview

Meta's new Forum app for iPhones takes Facebook Groups and moves them to a dedicated app with a dedicated AI chatbot to go with it, like an AI revamp of the ill-fated Groups app Facebook shut down in 2017. Rather than going to ChatGPT or tacking "Reddit" onto the end of a Google search, Forum users can view, search for, and post advice directly in their Facebook groups, with optional help from Meta's AI. After logging in with my Facebook account, Forum automatically pulled in the groups I was part of on Facebook and populated my feed with posts from those groups, along with suggestions from groups I'm not part of, similar to my Reddit feed, although without Reddit's pseudonymity. Groups aren't front-and-center in Facebook, so I wasn't surprised to find some on my list that I had completely forgotten about. Aside from the feed, you can also view a mini version of your Facebook profile that just shows your group posts, browse new groups, and post directly to specific groups. Forum's AI chatbot lives under the "Ask" tab, where you can get AI-generated responses pulling from posts to various Facebook groups, similar to the way Google's search results and AI overviews pull from the Reddit content it licenses and other sources on the internet. To try it out, I asked the AI a few questions about Magic: The Gathering. Meta's chatbot referenced posts from a couple of Magic groups I'm in and gave generally sound advice, with suggestions for groups in my area of New Jersey. The results included the posts the AI references, so you can tap them to view the full conversation around those posts. Meta communications manager Feryal Hemamda confirmed Forum's launch in a statement to The Verge: "We test lots of new products publicly to see what people find interesting and useful to their experiences across our apps."

Meta Launches Forum, a New Reddit-Like App for Facebook Groups

Forum lets you see 'what real people are saying, not just what's trending,' Meta says. Meta has quietly launched a new app for Facebook Groups called Forum. The app didn't get a formal launch but was spotted on the iOS App Store by analyst Matt Navarra. The App Store description suggests Meta is building it as a rival to Reddit. Forum is "a dedicated space built for deeper discussions, real answers, and the communities you care about," the company says. Once you log in to the app using your Facebook account, you'll be greeted with a feed of updates from Groups you've already joined. You can also search for and join new groups based on your interests. What makes the app a bit more Reddit-like is that you can publish comments or posts under a nickname. Note that everything you share on Forum will also be visible to Group members via Facebook. There's also an AI-powered Ask tab for quick answers from groups across Forum. It is the second option from the right on the bottom navigation bar, and you can tap it to seek the AI's opinions and recommendations. Similar to querying on chatbot apps, you can drop a question into Ask, and it will pull up curated responses based on comments made by "real people" across Facebook Groups. It will also let you join those groups. Group Admins get an additional AI feature: an AI assistant. It can help them "manage groups, moderate content, and keep their groups healthy," Meta says. For now, the app and its features may not be available in all regions. "We test lots of new products publicly to see what people find interesting and useful to their experiences across our apps," a company spokesperson tells Navarra. The analyst has also shared videos and screenshots of the app interface on X and Threads.

Meta's Latest App Looks Like Reddit

Meta has a new app on the App Store, and it looks an awful lot like Reddit. The app, called Forum, is "a dedicated space built for deeper discussions, real answers and communities you care about," according to its App Store page. In practice, it is just a standalone app version of Facebook's existing Groups feature, in which Facebook users can join groups and participate in discussions. In the new standalone app, the feed is entirely focused on the conversations taking place in the groups you are already a part of on your existing Facebook account. Forum and Facebook are still linked, meaning that you can enter Forum with your Facebook login, and whatever you post on there will be visible in your groups on the Facebook app as well. Some readers might be getting deja vu, and rightfully so, because this is Meta's second attempt at launching a stand-alone Facebook Groups app. Then known as Facebook, the company launched a similar, dedicated app back in 2014 that was ultimately discontinued in 2017. Perhaps to spice things up a bit, this time around, Meta is also including a dedicated AI assistant in the app. The "Ask" feature on the app will rely on the information posted on the group pages to respond to users looking for "opinions, advice or recommendations," Meta said. There is also an additional AI assistant for group admins, which will supposedly assist them with tasks like content moderation. Some financial analysts considered the app a direct threat to Reddit, causing the company's stock to end the day down more than 5%, but the apps have vastly different existing user bases. Either way, it's too soon to tell whether there will eventually be significant user migration from Reddit to Forum. This isn't Meta's first attempt at making its own version of an already successful app or feature. The company released its Twitter competitor app Threads in 2023, and most recently, it debuted Instants, an Instagram app that aims to replicate the successes of Snapchat and BeReal with instant, disappearing photos. Interestingly, this time around, Meta released this app with little fanfare. There was no major announcement or press release that we could find. The app just appeared on the App Store, and some eagle-eyed users noticed it. Which raises the question, could this be the start of an AI-enabled flood of new apps that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg reportedly promised employees? Late last month, the Wall Street Journal published a piece detailing a companywide meeting in which Zuckerberg talked about Meta's AI overhaul that has been used to justify a brutal round of layoffs. According to the report, Zuckerberg touted the efficiency gains from infusing AI into workflows and how the company will "be able to spin up more new projects" now because of this. Those new projects, according to the report, include creating more apps. "So like Chris [Cox, Meta's chief product officer] and I have been talking about, 'all right, well, can we build 50 new apps? Like, yeah, probably," Zuckerberg is quoted to have said in the article. "But we probably should start by doing a few before we just, like, ramp up trying to do 50 all at once."

Forum is Meta's new Facebook Groups app, and it looks a lot like Reddit

The new standalone app sits on top of Facebook Groups, adds an AI tab called "Ask" and an admin assistant, and arrives the same month Mark Zuckerberg told staff he and Chris Cox had discussed whether they could build 50 new apps. Meta has released a new standalone app called Forum, without a launch event, a blog post, or much of a press push at all. The product is built on top of Facebook Groups and is listed in the App Store as "a dedicated space built for deeper discussions, real answers and communities you care about," phrasing that does most of the work of telling you what Meta wants it to be: a Reddit, with a Facebook account attached. The launch was first spotted by the social-media consultant Matt Navarra and reported by TechCrunch, with independent confirmation from Engadget and MacRumors. A Meta spokesperson told Engadget the product was still in testing: "We test lots of new products publicly to see what people find interesting and useful to their experiences across our apps." Users sign in with their existing Facebook account, at which point their groups, profile and activity carry over. Posts can be made under a nickname, in the same way they can in the main Facebook app, although group administrators can still see real identities. Anything posted on Forum shows up in the corresponding group on Facebook, and vice versa, so the product is less a separate network than a separate front door into the one Meta already has. The feed is the differentiator. Where Facebook's main timeline mixes friends, Pages, algorithmic suggestions and ads, Forum's surfaces only conversations from groups a user is in, with prompts to discover others. Two AI features sit on top. The first, "Ask," lets users put a question to the app and receive an answer compiled from discussions across groups, sparing them the chore of searching one at a time. The second is an admin assistant designed to help moderators run groups and handle moderation. Both are pitched as time-savers rather than as the product's defining feature. This is not Meta's first standalone Groups app. The company shipped one in November 2014 and shut it down in 2017, for reasons it never made especially clear at the time. The Reddit framing is also conspicuous given timing: Reddit went public in March 2024, has spent the past two years licensing its data to AI companies for training, and remains the closest thing the consumer internet has to a working community-discussion product at scale. A Facebook-flavoured competitor with an AI answer tab is, at minimum, a recognisable shape. Forum is the second new Meta app in roughly a month. In late April, the company began testing Instants, a standalone Instagram companion for disappearing photos that borrows visibly from BeReal and Snapchat. Meta Edits, last year's CapCut-shaped video editor, sits in roughly the same lineage. That cadence is not an accident. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month that Zuckerberg told staff in an internal Q&A that AI-driven efficiency was allowing Meta to build more products with smaller teams, and that he and chief product officer Chris Cox had discussed whether the company could ship 50 new apps. He then talked himself partway back down: "Like, yeah probably. But we probably should start by doing a few before we just, like, ramp up trying to do 50 all at once." Forum is one of the few. Whether users want a separate app for their Facebook groups, with an AI tab attached, is the question the spokesperson's testing line was designed not to answer. The 2014 Groups app suggests one historical data point. The fate of Instants, Edits, and whatever ships next will produce the rest.

Facebook's got a new, secret app called Forum

So, like Quora/Reddit, only on Facebook? Credit: Forum/Facebook/Apple App Store Meta's got a brand new app, but the company isn't advertising it anywhere yet. The app is called Forum, and it's been spotted by Geekout Newsletter's Matt Navara (via Engadget). It's freely available to iPhone users, though it's not available in all markets yet. Per the app's official description, it's a "dedicated space built for deeper discussions, real answers and the communities you care about." In practice, it lies somewhere between Reddit and Quora, enabling users to ask questions and get related answers from folks on Facebook Groups. By default, it'll show you content from Facebook Groups based on your (previously selected) interests. On the admin side, Facebook says the app is build for people who run groups, giving them a new admin AI assistant to help manage their groups and moderate content. Facebook emphasises that this is about getting answers from "real people." Forum requires a Facebook account; the driving idea behind the app might be to leverage Facebook's vast community of users to provide answers, instead of getting AI-generated slop. Still, an AI assistant will fetch the answers when you ask a question on Forum. A Meta spokesperson told Engadget the app is still undergoing testing. "We test lots of new products publicly to see what people find interesting and useful to their experiences across our apps," the spokesperson said.

Meta built a Reddit rival out of Facebook Groups

Forum turns group posts into a standalone app built around questions, AI answers, and niche communities Meta has quietly launched Forum, a Facebook Groups app that pulls community answers into a cleaner standalone space. The app gives Groups a new home for discussions, recommendations, and replies that would normally sit inside Facebook. For anyone who has searched through years of group posts for a useful answer, Forum looks like Meta's attempt to make that knowledge easier to reach without sending people back into the main feed. Recommended Videos Forum is listed on the App Store as a free iPhone app from Meta. It's still unclear how widely the test is available beyond the U.S. listing and iPhone users. Why does Forum feel familiar Forum puts questions and community advice at the center of the experience. Users can search across group conversations, while posts and recommendations are organized around shared interests instead of a broader social feed. The Reddit comparison comes from that structure. Forum is built around the kind of niche discussions, recommendations, and back-and-forth answers that already make Facebook Groups valuable, only now they sit inside a dedicated product. AI is a major part of that setup. There's an Ask beta that can pull answers from group conversations, summarize interests, surface relevant discussions, and help admins manage communities. The tradeoff is trust, as Facebook Groups work because people bring lived experience, personal context, and niche expertise. If AI turns that into bland summaries, Forum loses the human texture it's trying to organize. How far from Facebook is this Forum still depends on the parent network. The App Store listing identifies it as a Facebook app. Users sign in with an existing Facebook account, with profile details and activity carrying over. That connection gives Meta a big head start. Forum can draw from years of group conversations, local recommendations, hobby communities, and support-style posts rather than waiting for users to rebuild those spaces from scratch. It also limits the reset. Anyone hoping for a clean break from Facebook's identity system and social graph probably won't find it here. What happens if the test sticks Forum is still early. Meta is calling it a public test, and the App Store listing notes that some features may vary by country or region. The bigger signal is where Meta sees value. Groups already hold searchable advice, local tips, hobby knowledge, and support threads, and Forum gives that material a dedicated product with AI built into discovery. For now, treat Forum as an experiment rather than a full Reddit replacement. The next things to watch are Android availability, a wider rollout, and whether Meta can make AI speed up group search without muting the people behind the answers.

Meta's Upcoming Forum App Might Blend Reddit-Style Threads With AI Features

Meta is reportedly developing a new forum app that may combine Reddit-style discussions with AI-driven tools and recommendations. Meta may soon enter the online discussion platform space with a new app called Forum. After the release and , the company is once again in the limelight with the Forum platform, which is reportedly poised to be a potent rival to Reddit. According to the , the company is testing a platform built around public discussions and interest-based communities. The app may allow users to create posts, join topic groups, and reply to ongoing conversations. Thus, the comparison with Reddit is inevitable. However, the Meta app will focus entirely on Facebook groups and community discussions. The Forum app may also include several AI-based features. These tools could help users find useful posts faster, summarize long conversations, and suggest replies during discussions. Meta is also expected to use AI for content moderation and spam control. Access to the app requires an active Facebook account. As long as users have an existing Facebook profile, the group and community history will be automatically transferred to the Forum once they complete login. The platform further supports anonymized usernames for public interactions. However, group administrators can see each participant's original name and profile. Additionally, anything shared from the Forum will automatically sync to Facebook. Thus, users don't need to switch apps to manage their posts. To be precise, Forum will be fully integrated with the Facebook ecosystem. Also Read: The timing is important. Many young users now spend more time in smaller online groups where conversations feel more natural and less crowded. Platforms built around discussions have slowly gained more attention in recent years. Meta, however, may face a trust problem. Some users remain worried about privacy, ads, and content control on . If Forum becomes too aggressive with recommendations or promotions, it may struggle to keep users interested for long.

Meta may be building its own Reddit rival with new Forum app: Here is what we know

Users will still need a Facebook account, and all activity on Forum will remain synced with the main Facebook app. After Instants, Meta is now planning to introduce a standalone app called Forum, a platform which focuses entirely on Facebook Groups and community conversations. The app appeared on Apple's App Store without any formal announcements from the company and seems to position itself as discussion-driven space where users can discover information and interact with communities in a way that resembles platforms like Reddit. Unlike the regular Facebook feed that mixes posts from friends, Pages, recommended content and groups, Forum is reportedly made around conversations happening inside Groups. The app reportedly allows users to browse discussions from their joined communities in a separate dedicated feed, while also surfacing posts from other Groups based on interests selected during onboarding. However, Forum is still closely tied to the Facebook ecosystem. The users need a Facebook account to access the app and their existing profile, activity and group memberships automatically carry over after login. While the platform supports anonymised usernames for public interactions, Group administrators can still view the real identity behind those accounts. Also read: ChatGPT can now make your presentation using text prompts: Here is how The app is said to offer some AI powered tools called Ask which may help users search across multiple Groups at once to find answers without manually browsing each community individually. Meta is also reportedly testing an AI assistant for moderators that can help manage conversations and administrative tasks inside Groups. Anything posted through Forum will continue syncing with Facebook itself, allowing users to switch between the two apps without losing conversations or discussions. This is not the first time Meta has experimented with a Groups-focused platform. The company had previously launched a standalone Facebook Groups app years ago before discontinuing it in 2017. The reports also suggest that Meta has confirmed the app is currently in the testing phase adding that the company frequently experiments with new products publicly.