External Destinations

External destinations are the off-app actions the AI is allowed to suggest — WhatsApp numbers, phone lines, app store URLs, map locations, generic web URLs. When a user message warrants one (“How do I reach support?”, “Where’s the nearest store?”), the AI picks from this list and the SDK renders a button that opens the right link.

Why a Pre-Defined List

Without this, the AI would have to generate phone numbers and URLs from training data — leading to either refusals (when it doesn’t know) or hallucinated values (when it guesses wrong, which is worse). External destinations make the canonical set explicit: the AI suggests from your curated list, never invents.

Tuning Suggestion Quality

The description is the field the AI uses to decide when to suggest each destination. “Customer support WhatsApp” is concrete; “contact” is too generic and competes with itself. Write descriptions like you’d write a tool description — specific enough that the AI can disambiguate.

The optional fallback URL kicks in when the primary one isn’t handleable on the device (e.g. WhatsApp not installed → fall back to web wa.me link). Set fallbacks for any destination where install-state varies — phone-not-installed and app-store-not-available are common edge cases.

Disabling vs Deleting

Disabling a destination keeps it in the list but hides it from the AI’s matching pool. Useful for seasonal contacts (campaign-only WhatsApp), temporarily-broken endpoints, or staging destinations you want to flip on later. Deleting wipes the destination — the AI never sees it again.

SDK Side

The mobile app receives external suggestions via the onExternalSuggestion callback. By default the SDK opens the URL with React Native’s Linking API and falls back to fallbackUrl when the target app isn’t installed. Override the callback to add analytics, a confirmation modal, or in-app WebView wrapping for website destinations. See External Navigation guide for the full SDK contract.