Anthropic Opens a Preview of Claude Duet, a Proactive AI Agent

Anthropic on October 21, 2026 opened a research preview of Claude Duet, a new app where Claude works as a proactive agent. Anthropic says it “comes to you with what needs your attention, completes tasks you ask of it, keeps working even when you step away, and checks with you before it acts on your behalf.”

Anthropic says it built Duet for professionals and small business owners.

What it does

• Each morning it sends a short brief on the most important items across your connected apps.
• Through the day it keeps tabs on those apps and messages you only when something needs your attention. Anthropic says it checks accounts every few hours, because checking nonstop would burn through plan limits.
• You can hand it bigger jobs, from scheduling meetings to building dashboards, financial or sales forecasts, prototypes and web apps.
• It can use the more than 6,000 connectors and plugins in the Claude Marketplace, with examples including Gmail, Slack, QuickBooks, Stripe, Gusto, HubSpot, Docusign, Canva and Shopify.

How it works

Anthropic says Duet was designed around Claude Opus 5.5, and its help center says users can’t pick a different model during the preview. Duet has a virtual machine with its own browser, so it doesn’t need your laptop or phone to be on. It carries over your memory, skills and connected apps from your Claude account.

Guardrails

Before Duet sends a message, makes a payment, signs a document, or deletes anything, Anthropic says it shows you exactly what it’s about to do and waits for your approval. Some actions, like trading securities or moving money between accounts, are off-limits even with approval. Anthropic also says a new classifier is designed to reject requests to share credit card numbers and government ID.

Who can get it

Duet is available by waitlist, starting with Pro and Max subscribers in the US, as a standalone app on iOS and Android and on claude.ai. During the preview it’s included at no extra cost but shares the plan’s usage limits, and background checks count toward them. It isn’t on Team or Enterprise plans yet.

Anthropic warns this is an early version that “still might misread a thread or miscalibrate what’s urgent.”