Anthropic's Claude Duet AI agent can manage your work across thousands of connected apps — here’s how it works

(Image credit: Shutterstock) AI agents built to operate as personal assistants that boost one’s productivity have been popping up all over the place as of late.Meta Muse has emerged as one of the more popular apps tied to that distinction. Plus, the likes of OpenAI Dots, Grok Bot, and Instinct are part of the expanding AI agent offerings being used today. Anthropic must have been keeping a close eye on this emerging trend, as the AI-focused tech giant just launched an AI agent of its own.The brand new Claude Duet iOS and Android app, which is designed to be an incredibly efficient digital partner for busy professionals, has now been released as a research preview for Claude users subscribed to the Pro and Max plans in the US through a waitlist. And while it’s not readily accessible for Claude subscribers on Team and Research plans just yet, Anthropic is planning to bring it to those plans at an unannounced date. Keep in mind that Claude Duet has the same usage limits as the rest of Claude for Pro and Max subscribers,Here’s what Anthropic promises its newly released Claude Duet AI agent app can do.Claude Duet is a new agentic AI app meant to work for professionals (Image credit: Shutterstock)The Claude Duet app works as an AI agent powered by Claude Opus 5.5 and its capabilities mainly cater to streamlining the daily operations of professionals. Since it works directly with a user’s Claude account, all the memory, skills and connectors you’ve previously set up will be in place from the very first time you send a message to Claude Duet.And since the app works from its own computer in the cloud, it can keep working on any tasks it’s been given even after you close the app. Introducing Claude Duet - YouTube Watch On Of course, you can type out a message to Claude Duet or record a voice message to make it start working.Sign up to the Tom's AI Guide weekly newsletter summing up all the biggest AI news you need to know. Plus, analysis from our AI editors and tips on how to use the latest AI tools!As for what it can do for you without you even having to ask, Anthropic’s AI agent app can send you a brief every morning, depending on the information contained in the connected email and calendar you’ve given it access to. Claude Duet is promised to be able to pick out the assignments that require a user’s immediate attention and lay out the steps needed to complete the task at hand. And as the day wears on, the app will send you updates on the tasks it’s working on and occasionally follow up on any text/voice note threads that haven’t been tended to in a while.One of the more surprising things about Claude Duet is the massive library of connected apps it can use. Some of the 6,000+ connectors and plugins you can grant it access to include Gmail, Slack, Intuit QuickBooks, Stripe, LinkedIn, DocuSign, etc. User privacy and safety are at the forefront of Anthropic’s foundation for Claude Duet. Claude Duet has the capacity to work with those apps to help you reply to important messages, keep a close eye on unpaid invoices, create/edit/approve job postings, prepare contract agreements before sending them off, etc.The AI agent app automatically rejects highly sensitive information (such as credit card numbers and government IDs, for instance) and always asks for approval before taking the next step for a crucial task (like making payments).In its current research preview state, Claude Duet does have a few limitations in place. You can’t choose the model it runs on, you can’t observe it work in a browser or take over the browser yourself and the Microsoft 365 connector is not yet available for use with it. For a full list of what Clade Duet can’t do right now, check out this official blog post from Anthropic.Bottom lineClaude Duet sounds like it can eventually transform into a viable competitor in the AI agent market and become the Meta Muse for professionals that they've been looking for.If you’re interested in trying it out for yourself, it’s worth joining the Claude Duet waitlist and seeing if you get access to it at some point. Follow Tom's Guide on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our up-to-date news, analysis, and reviews in your feeds. Subscribe to Tom's Guide on YouTube and follow us on TikTok.More from Tom’s GuideYour Mac has a free AI chatbot hiding in plain sight — here's how to use itGoogle just cut down 250,000 trees for AI data centers — and now it's facing a major backlash“A cyber compromise could potentially translate into unsafe physical behavior”: how AI worms could threaten cars and drones Elton Jones covers AI for Tom’s Guide, and tests all the latest models, from ChatGPT to Gemini to Claude to see which tools perform best — and how they can improve everyday productivity.He is also an experienced tech writer who has covered video games, mobile devices, headsets, and now artificial intelligence for over a decade. Since 2011, his work has appeared in publications including The Christian Post, Complex, TechRadar, Heavy, and ONE37pm, with a focus on clear, practical analysis.Today, Elton focuses on making AI more accessible by breaking down complex topics into useful, easy-to-understand insights for a wide range of readers.