Jest just got a lot more social. Users can now chat with each other in one global room, accessible from anywhere on the site or inside any app.
Why we built it
Over a million people have used apps on Jest and, until recently, not one of them could say a word to each other. On a platform built on messaging, that was pretty ironic!
Our hypothesis was that giving users somewhere to talk would make Jest feel like a place you go rather than a thing you use, and that people who feel that way stick around.
What we launched
One global room. Anyone can read it, and registered users can post, which turns out to be one more good reason for a user to make an account.
Every message shows the sender’s avatar and the apps they’ve most recently played, and links straight through to their public profile for a closer look. AI moderation checks messages against our Chat Code of Conduct to make sure chat stays fun and safe for everyone, and humans review violations.
Results so far
Unsurprisingly, we’ve already seen communities flourish.
To date, 36% of logged-in users have opened chat, the vast majority of them from inside an app, and 23% of those have sent at least one message.
And they’re not just looking. Median messages per sender per week has gone from 1 to 3, and the 90th percentile went from 3 to 23, so both the middle and the tail are growing.
Honestly, we think studios will get more out of this than we will. Reading your own app’s chat during launch week is about the cheapest user research there is - we’ve seen users say things to each other they would never put in a formal bug report.
But beyond turning into a live feedback channel in the days after a release, it’s just incredible to watch people organically helping each other learn and enjoy the apps together.
What’s next
Exciting things ahead. Per-app rooms are the big one, so conversation about your app isn’t competing with everything else happening on Jest.
Then think flair: reactions, custom emojis, richer link previews, etc. Plus more tools for developers, such as surfacing feedback and bug reports from your app’s chat in real time and ways to share your own updates with users following along.
If your app has a community and you have a view on how that should work, we’d love to hear it. We’re early enough that the studios who talk to us now help shape what gets built.
New to Jest? The developer docs are open to everyone.