Anthropic Previews Claude Duet, a Proactive Agent That Works Your Inbox While You're Away
Anthropic opened a US research preview of Claude Duet, an app where Claude monitors Gmail, Slack, and your calendar, completes tasks in the background, and checks in before acting on your behalf.
Anthropic is making its biggest bet yet that the chatbot era is ending. On Wednesday the company announced a research preview of Claude Duet, describing it as "a new app where Claude works as a proactive agent." The pitch inverts the familiar interaction model: instead of waiting for a prompt, Duet "comes to you with what needs your attention, completes tasks you ask of it, keeps working when you step away, and checks with you before it acts on your behalf."
According to a breakdown from @EbiThinks, Duet monitors Gmail, Slack, and calendar data, completes work in the background, and can build dashboards, apps, and financial forecasts before notifying the user that a task is done. Crucially, it "asks permission before important actions"—a design choice that reflects the central tension of any autonomous assistant: how much latitude to grant software operating inside your email and messages without constant supervision.
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