Imagine your favorite tools like Asana, Figma, Slack, and Canva, now running right inside Claude! This awesome new feature makes integrating them super easy, helping more people experience the power of ‘agentic AI.’
Anthropic just gave its clever chatbot, Claude, a cool new trick: you can now use other apps directly within Claude itself!
They’re calling this new feature ‘interactive apps,’ and it’s built on something called — MCP Apps — which extends the open-source Model Context Protocol (MCP).
First suggested back in November and then developed with a little help from OpenAI’s Apps SDK, MCP Apps lets you bring tools right into your chat with Claude. Think of it: actual interactive elements showing up in your conversation, not just plain text or search results!
“Claude already works with your tools and can even do things for you. But now, those tools appear right there in your chat, letting you see everything unfold and work together in the moment!” Anthropic explained in a blog post.
Right now, you can play with interactive versions of Amplitude, Asana, Box, Canva, Clay, Figma, Hex, monday.com, and Slack. Salesforce’s Agentforce 360 is coming soon, and Anthropic promises even more apps will join the party!
Making Workflows a Breeze
Claude is transforming from just a chatbot into a hub where apps can actually run. Experts believe this will really help businesses bring advanced ‘agentic AI’ systems into their everyday operations on a much larger scale.
Being able to use apps right inside Claude means less hassle, making it super straightforward for companies to use Claude as an intelligent ‘agent’ across all their tasks,” explained Akshat Tyagi, an associate practice leader at HFS Research.
Tyagi pointed out, “Many pilot projects fail because these AI agents can be a bit unpredictable, tough to manage, and tricky to fit into how we actually work. Claude’s interactive apps are a game-changer for that!”
And for developers in big companies, less complicated integration means they can work faster and get more done, says Forrester Principal Analyst Charlie Dai.
Dai added that this approach makes it much simpler to create complex workflows that produce results, without needing tons of complicated setup or custom coding.
A Big Boost for Productivity
Tyagi thinks it’s not just developers who will get a productivity boost; business teams will also see huge benefits. Since so many apps are now integrated into Claude, teams won’t have to jump between different systems, copy information, or figure out how to turn AI suggestions into actual tasks.
Interestingly, Chandrika Dutt, a research director at Avasant, sees MCP Apps and Anthropic’s overall strategy as highlighting a growing divide in how AI is being built. While everyone wants to make us more productive by putting AI agents right into our daily work, they’re taking different paths to get there.
Dutt explained that Anthropic and OpenAI are creating systems where apps actually run within the AI itself. Meanwhile, big players like Microsoft and Google are embedding AI into their existing productivity tools, like Microsoft 365 Copilot and Google Gemini Workspace.
She believes, “These are really just two different roads leading to the same destination. As more businesses want AI agents to do more for them, it’s pretty likely these approaches will eventually merge. We’ll probably see Microsoft and Google also start to support more interactive, app-level features down the line.”
Plus, Dutt highlighted that Claude’s new interactive apps will make it simpler for companies to govern and trust their AI systems – super important when you’re trying to use ‘agentic AI’ widely.
She elaborated, “Claude works right on the screen you’re looking at, with the same data and settings. This means you can see exactly what changes are being made, where they’re happening, and how they impact your tasks, files, or designs, all in real-time – no more bouncing between different tools to check!”
A New Challenge: More Careful Checks Needed
But, there’s a flip side: experts warn that having everything in one place could significantly increase security risks, especially as more and more apps get added to the mix.
Why? Because using these interactive apps means running code that companies didn’t create themselves. This means businesses will have to be extra careful and do thorough checks before linking up any interactive application, according to Abhishek Sengupta, a practice director at Everest Group.
Good news though: MCP Apps does come with some built-in security features! It can sandbox app interfaces, lets companies review templates before they’re displayed, and even audits communications between the app server and your Claude client.
This cool interactive app feature is currently available to everyone with a paid Claude subscription – that includes Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise users.
Anthropic also mentioned that it will be coming to Claude Cowork pretty soon.
