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Meta moved to ban third-party chatbots from WhatsApp, which would have removed ChatGPT and Copilot in 2026.
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The European Commission ordered Meta to restore free access for rival AI assistants.
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The order holds until the Commission’s antitrust investigation concludes.
Meta tried to make WhatsApp a Meta AI exclusive. Europe said no, and said it fast.
What Meta tried
WhatsApp has roughly 3 billion monthly active users, making it the most used messenger app in the world. For a while, that reach was open. ChatGPT and Copilot both ran as WhatsApp chatbots, letting anyone with the number talk to a rival assistant without installing anything.
Then Meta moved to shut third-party AI chatbots out of WhatsApp in favour of Meta AI. ChatGPT and Copilot were set to leave the platform in 2026.
The logic is easy to follow. Meta AI is fighting for users against assistants with better brand recognition. WhatsApp is the single largest distribution channel Meta owns. Closing it turns 3 billion users into a captive audience.
What the Commission did
On June 8 the European Commission imposed interim measures ordering Meta to restore free access to WhatsApp for rival general-purpose AI assistants, and to maintain that access until the end of the Commission’s antitrust investigation.
Interim measures matter more than they sound. Regulators normally investigate for years and then rule. Interim measures mean the Commission decided the harm was happening now and could not wait for the full case. That is a strong signal about where the eventual decision is heading.
The precedent is the real story here, and it reaches well beyond Meta. The Commission is treating access to a messaging platform as something an AI competitor can be entitled to.
If a dominant app cannot lock its distribution to its own AI, then every large platform holder faces the same question. Can Apple keep rivals off iMessage? Can Google reserve Android’s assistant slot?
For anyone building on top of these platforms, the lesson is sharper than the headline. Distribution you do not own can be closed on a product decision and reopened on a regulator’s order, and neither one is under your control.
Building a business inside someone else’s chat app remains a bet on their goodwill, or on a regulator being fast enough.
Europe was fast this time. Nobody should assume that repeats.
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