Agent updates
The latest meaningful changes to AI agents, checked against the vendors' own announcements. Each entry links to its source and the work it affects.
Eligible US ecommerce and online service businesses can add a customer-facing Business Agent in ChatGPT, in beta, to answer questions from the information they provide.
Customer chat
Most useful for: Customer Service Representative, Ecommerce Manager, Front Desk Admin
Scribe v3 and Scribe v3 Live transcribe recorded or live audio with improved accuracy, speaker labels and timestamps.
Documents
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Legal Secretary, Podcast Editor
ElevenLabs launched Campaign Manager for outbound phone and WhatsApp campaigns, with retries, follow-ups and calling windows (it replaces batch calling).
Bookings & calendar
Most useful for: Sales Development Representative, Recruiter, Sales Representative
Images 2.6 generates and edits images faster, keeps details more consistent across edits, and can turn a still image into a GIF.
Content
Most useful for: Graphic Designer, Social Media Manager, Marketing Coordinator
With Grok Bot 1.0, a Bot can join Google Meet, Zoom or Microsoft Teams, take notes, answer questions in the meeting chat, and send a summary and action items afterwards (Team, Enterprise and Ultra plans).
Documents
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Administrative Assistant, Project Manager
At Gemini at Work 2026, Google introduced Gemini agents that can have their own email address, calendar and Drive, and that teammates can @mention in Chat or Docs.
Inbox
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Office Manager, Operations Manager
Retell agents can keep a short brief on each contact across calls and SMS, so a returning caller does not have to repeat themselves.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Customer Service Representative, Sales Representative, Virtual Receptionist
Browser Use in the n8n Assistant, which can work in your Chrome browser, was released to all users on supported Cloud plans.
Admin
Most useful for: Virtual Assistant, Executive Assistant, Marketing Coordinator
Eleven v4 is ElevenLabs' more expressive text-to-speech model, including a faster Turbo version for voice agents.
Content
Most useful for: Podcast Editor, Instructional Designer, Content Creator
Manus 2.0 added Automations, so work can start on a schedule or when something happens in a connected service such as email, a calendar, Slack or Notion.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Marketing Operations Manager, Automation Consultant, Office Manager
Manus 2.0 upgraded the desktop app to Manus Studio, a shared workspace for documents, spreadsheets, slides, websites, code, games and video.
Documents
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Business Analyst, Marketing Manager
n8n launched standalone Agents you set up once and can chat with, drop into a workflow, connect to Slack, or run on a schedule.
Inbox
Most useful for: Automation Consultant, Marketing Operations Manager, Office Manager
Gemini can find open times, schedule meetings and resolve conflicts from Chat, Docs, Drive or Gmail, with a confirm card before it takes an external action.
Bookings & calendar
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Office Manager, Recruiter
Vapi added outbound campaigns for batch or scheduled calls, with calling windows, concurrency limits, retries and voicemail handling.
Bookings & calendar
Most useful for: Sales Development Representative, Recruiter, Sales Representative
Copilot Cowork can create and edit images using OpenAI's ChatGPT Images 2.0 model.
Content
Most useful for: Graphic Designer, Social Media Manager, Marketing Coordinator
xAI launched Grok Bot, an always-on teammate with its own cloud computer, browser and connected apps, that can keep working after you step away.
Bookings & calendar
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Virtual Assistant, Office Manager
OpenAI launched ChatGPT Work, an agent for longer, multi-step jobs that can research, use apps and files, and return finished documents, spreadsheets, decks and sites.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Business Analyst, Business Management Consultant, Executive Assistant
GPT-Live now powers ChatGPT Voice, so conversations can overlap naturally and Voice can hand harder questions to the latest models in the background.
Most useful for: Customer Service Representative, Sales Representative, Front Desk Admin
You can schedule recurring prompts to agents such as Analyst in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Data Analyst, Management Accountant, Operations Manager
Moonshot launched Kimi Work (beta), a Mac and Windows agent that works with folders on your computer and can return documents, spreadsheets and decks.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Business Analyst, Office Manager
Teams on ChatGPT Business, Enterprise and Edu can build shared agents with connected apps that run on a schedule, in Slack, or from an API trigger.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Operations Manager, Marketing Operations Manager, Project Manager
Agentic Copilot in Excel (formerly Agent Mode) can build and edit sheets, tables, formulas and charts in the open workbook.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Accountant, Data Analyst, Management Accountant
Microsoft launched Copilot Cowork, which takes a goal and carries out multi-step work across Microsoft 365, then returns the finished result for you to review.
Documents
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Operations Manager, Project Manager
Copilot in Outlook can draft, triage and summarise mail, and help schedule meetings, in a more agent-like way.
Inbox
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Office Manager, Administrative Assistant
The same 9 Mar 2026 announcement brought agentic drafting in Word and Agent Mode in PowerPoint, so Copilot can build and edit documents and decks in place.
Documents
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Marketing Manager, Business Management Consultant
Nous Research released Hermes Agent, an open-source agent you install on your own machine or server, using your own model keys or a Nous plan.
Most useful for: IT Manager, Systems Administrator, Software Engineer
Anthropic upgraded Claude in Excel and released Claude in PowerPoint as a research preview, so Claude can work inside open workbooks and decks.
Spreadsheets & data
Most useful for: Data Analyst, Management Accountant, Business Management Consultant
Gemini in Chrome can complete multi-step web tasks in your browser, including on signed-in sites, and pauses when it needs you to sign in.
Bookings & calendar
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Virtual Assistant, Marketing Coordinator
Anthropic launched Cowork, an agent for longer, multi-step work that can use local files, connectors and the web and return finished documents and spreadsheets.
Documents
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Business Analyst, Marketing Manager
Manus launched Browser Operator, a browser extension that lets Manus work in your own Chrome or Edge session on sites you are already signed in to.
Bookings & calendar
Most useful for: Executive Assistant, Virtual Assistant, Purchasing Officer
