diff --git a/src/plugins/navigation/flow-types.js b/src/plugins/navigation/flow-types.js
index 9ee06d539..c9123b2ed 100644
--- a/src/plugins/navigation/flow-types.js
+++ b/src/plugins/navigation/flow-types.js
@@ -39,3 +39,8 @@ export type AutoCompleteLineItem = {|
   matchPattern: string,
   uri: URI,
 |};
+
+export type AppMatchPattern = {|
+  className: string,
+  pattern: string,
+|};
diff --git a/src/plugins/navigation/util/appMatchPatterns.js b/src/plugins/navigation/util/appMatchPatterns.js
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..552262a93
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/plugins/navigation/util/appMatchPatterns.js
@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+/**
+ * Copyright 2018-present Facebook.
+ * This source code is licensed under the MIT license found in the
+ * LICENSE file in the root directory of this source tree.
+ * @format
+ * @flow strict-local
+ */
+
+import fs from 'fs';
+import path from 'path';
+
+import type {AppMatchPattern} from '../flow-types';
+
+const extractAppNameFromSelectedApp = (selectedApp: ?string) => {
+  if (selectedApp == null) {
+    return null;
+  } else {
+    return selectedApp.split('#')[0];
+  }
+};
+
+export const getAppMatchPatterns = (selectedApp: ?string) => {
+  return new Promise<Array<AppMatchPattern>>((resolve, reject) => {
+    const appName = extractAppNameFromSelectedApp(selectedApp);
+    if (appName === 'Facebook') {
+      const patternsPath = path.join(
+        'facebook',
+        'facebook-match-patterns.json',
+      );
+      fs.readFile(patternsPath, (err, data) => {
+        if (err) {
+          reject(err);
+        } else {
+          resolve(JSON.parse(data.toString()));
+        }
+      });
+    } else if (appName != null) {
+      reject(new Error('No rule for app ' + appName));
+    } else {
+      reject(new Error('selectedApp was null'));
+    }
+  });
+};