Slack Introduces 'Surfaces' to Let Users Build Custom Apps Inside Chat
A new feature allows teams to describe tools, reports, and dashboards in plain English and instantly embed them into channels.
Slack has announced a new capability called Slackforce Surfaces, bringing generative interface design directly into team messaging channels. The feature allows any employee to ask Slackbot for a custom interactive tool — such as a team poll, a live sales dashboard, or an interactive project tracker — and have it generated right inside the chat window.
Surfaces works by combining AI generation with data fetched from connected workplace tools like Salesforce, Google Drive, and past Slack conversations. Users describe what they want to see, and the AI drafts an interactive interface that colleagues can click, edit, and pin directly in channel headers.
Bridging Chat and Internal Software
Rather than jumping between multiple SaaS tabs to check metrics or collect feedback, Surfaces turns regular conversations into functional mini-applications. When a team member interacts with an embedded chart or submits an update through a Surface, the tool can push those changes back to the underlying databases in real time.
What This Means for You as a Builder
This move highlights how software development is shifting from static, hard-coded dashboards to disposable, on-demand interfaces. As a builder, you do not always need to build a full standalone web portal for your automations — delivering structured interactive widgets right where people already talk is often the fastest path to team adoption.