Bolt.new AI and Smooch (now Zendesk Sunshine Conversations) integration: Step-by-Step Guide 2025

To integrate Bolt.new with Smooch (now Zendesk Sunshine Conversations), you don’t “connect Bolt itself” — you build a normal backend inside Bolt.new that talks to the Sunshine Conversations REST API using your app’s API Key + Secret. Incoming user messages arrive via a webhook you expose in your Bolt.new project, and outgoing messages are sent via Sunshine’s messages API. The whole integration is just standard HTTPS, webhooks, environment variables, and auth headers. Once you create the Sunshine Conversations app in Zendesk, you take the keys, wire the webhook, and then your Bolt backend becomes the middleware between users and your AI logic.

 

What You Actually Do (the real, correct integration pattern)

 

You integrate Bolt.new AI with Smooch / Sunshine Conversations by creating a server endpoint inside Bolt that receives messages from Sunshine via webhooks, then you call the Sunshine Conversations REST API to send messages back. Authentication is done using API Key and API Secret provided in the Sunshine Conversations dashboard. Bolt projects simply store these in environment variables. Sunshine Conversations doesn’t offer any automatic “AI agent” integration — you wire it manually like any other messaging API.

• You expose a Bolt API route like /webhooks/smooch.
• You register that route as a webhook in Sunshine Conversations.
• Your endpoint receives all inbound messages from any connected channel (WhatsApp, Messenger, webchat, etc.).
• Your code processes the message, runs your AI logic, then sends a reply via POST /v2/apps/{appId}/conversations/{conversationId}/messages.

 

Step-by-step Explanation (simple + correct)

 

Below is the real flow you follow when building this inside Bolt.new.

• Create a Sunshine Conversations app in the Zendesk dashboard.
• Copy the App ID, Key ID, and Secret.
• In Bolt.new, open project settings and add environment variables like: SUNSHINE_APP_ID, SUNSHINE_KEY_ID, SUNSHINE\_SECRET.
• Expose a webhook route in your backend (Node.js in most Bolt templates).
• Take the public URL of that webhook (Bolt provides it automatically when running) and paste it into Sunshine Conversations → Webhooks.
• Implement outbound messages using Sunshine’s REST API with HTTP basic auth (Key ID + Secret).

 

Minimal Real Example (Node.js backend inside Bolt.new)

 

// routes/smooch.js
import express from "express";
import axios from "axios";

const router = express.Router();

// Sunshine Conversations REST API base URL
const BASE_URL = "https://api.smooch.io/v2/apps";

// Inbound webhook from Sunshine Conversations
router.post("/webhooks/smooch", async (req, res) => {
  const event = req.body;

  // Validate inbound event type
  if (event.trigger === "message:appUser") {
    const appId = process.env.SUNSHINE_APP_ID;
    const { conversation } = event;
    const { text } = event.messages[0]; // The user's message

    // Call your AI logic here
    const aiReply = await runAI(text); // You implement runAI()

    // Send reply back to user via Sunshine API
    await axios.post(
      `${BASE_URL}/${appId}/conversations/${conversation.id}/messages`,
      {
        role: "appMaker",
        type: "text",
        text: aiReply
      },
      {
        auth: {
          username: process.env.SUNSHINE_KEY_ID,
          password: process.env.SUNSHINE_SECRET
        }
      }
    );
  }

  // Sunshine requires fast 200 response
  res.status(200).send("ok");
});

// Example stub for your AI logic
async function runAI(userText) {
  // Call your AI provider here
  return "Thanks! I received: " + userText;
}

export default router;

 

Important Notes

 

• Sunshine Conversations uses Basic Auth, not OAuth.
• Your webhook must respond in under ~3 seconds or Sunshine may consider it failed. Do not block on slow AI calls — keep it fast or async.
• You can test easily in Bolt because the dev server URL is publicly accessible.
• Channels like WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram all flow through the same webhook — Sunshine normalizes them.
• No magic: it’s all just HTTPS in/out.

 

Summary

 

Integrating Bolt.new with Smooch (Sunshine Conversations) is simply creating a normal backend that handles a webhook from Sunshine for inbound messages and uses their REST API with basic auth to send outgoing messages. You store your Sunshine creds in environment variables, expose a webhook route in Bolt, register it in Sunshine’s dashboard, and wire your AI response flow inside that route. This is the correct, real, production pattern.