What's New in Bots: Oct 29, 2026
Slackbot learned to act the moment something happens, Grok Bot started shopping with product cards, and you can now text your OpenAI Dot, so here is what is new in bots.
Grok Bot: shopping cards and subscription templates
Grok Bot 0.78.1 is on the Grok Bot changelog. Shopping now shows products as cards with photos, rating, price and store, Buy now starts an order you approve, and the Bot tracks the order until it ships and arrives. Shop Pay joins the Vault's Payments tab. Three new templates go after the money you forget about: Try it, don't pay for it starts a free trial and cancels it before it bills, Find unused subscriptions cancels the plans you pick, and Watch subscription prices checks renewals. Team Bots can now carry their own Vault logins. If you are buying with bots, this is the release to try.
Slackbot: Event-Triggered Tasks and Slackbot Mini
Slack shipped a big Slackbot update on Oct 28. Event-Triggered Tasks let Slackbot act when a message lands, someone reacts, a list item changes or a channel is created, and you choose ask me first or auto-approve. Slackbot Mini is a floating window and menu bar icon so you can ask or run a Skill without opening Slack. Skills get a My skills and Discover view, and developers got the Slackbot skills API to create and roll out skills from code. Slackbot can also transcribe audio or video up to 100 MB and work through up to 20 calendar invites at a time with your approval. Good timing if you are setting up team bots.
Dots: text your dot
OpenAI's Dots can now be reached by text. Per Gadgets 360, ChatGPT posted on Oct 28 that you can text your dot over iMessage or RCS with words, photos or voice notes, and it will text you back with updates. Only you can text your dot and it only texts you. It is rolling out as a preview for ChatGPT Pro users in the US.
Muse: Singapore and Realtime Avatar
Meta brought Muse to Singapore, with connectors to Shopee, Grab, Singapore Airlines, Agoda, ShopBack, Klook, Trip.com and Lazada rolling out over time. Meta research also introduced Muse Realtime Avatar, which turns Muse's realtime voice into an expressive talking avatar from a reference image. It is the most family friendly agent on the list, which is why it shows up in our guide to staffing your family with bots.
Microsoft Copilot: the harness goes public
Microsoft is making the Copilot harness available through Microsoft Foundry. It is the same multi model agent layer behind Copilot Studio, the GitHub Copilot app, the CLI and VS Code, with 20+ models plus bring your own key, built for long running tasks.
Perplexity: voice mode on the Mac
Perplexity upgraded voice mode in its Mac app and on the web for Pro and Max subscribers. It runs on OpenAI's gpt-live-1 and can juggle several Computer sessions, start tasks and manage Projects in one voice session.
Quick Facts
- New today: Grok Bot shopping cards, Slackbot Event-Triggered Tasks, texting your Dot.
- Still rolling: Claude Duet invites for US Max, then US Pro (see yesterday's roundup).
- Compare them yourself in the directory.
See you tomorrow.