Behold, Facebook’s New App Center Leaks Into iOS

Facebook is planning to launch a new mobile App Center in the coming days — possibly at an app-themed press event that the company is holding this evening in San Francisco. In the meantime, we’ve just received a screenshot from an iPhone-using reader who appears to be seeing it live already. We are awaiting confirmation from Facebook, but the image looks legit.

Similar to the interfaces that the company showed off in early May when it announced the App Center plans, you can see a left-hand navigation feature within Facebook’s feature-heavy iOS app. Apps with unread notifications appear in the top section. If you click through, you see the App Center (and you’ll note that the logo in the screenshot also matches what Facebook has previously released).

Facebook has been working hard to be more of a mobile platform. It has rolled out mobile sign-on features, mobile versions of its Credits virtual currency, and most recently Open Graph hooks that mobile app developers have been taking full advantage of (witness the turgid rise of Socialcam and Viddy for evidence of those features being exploited).

This new interface could get more users downloading Facebook-enabled mobile apps. The main drawback is that Facebook’s mobile app is already so full of features that many users find it hard to use. Stuffing in an App Center isn’t going to ease the load.

Here’s what Facebook has already shown off:

And here’s a closer look at the screenshot we’ve received (we’re waiting for more, and send them to tips@techcrunch.com if you have them):