Claude's Duet agent is helpful but neurotic

Anthropic launches Duet for professionals

Claude Duet is Anthropic's AI agent for consumers, focused on work rather than shopping or coding. It's a research preview available to Pro, Max, and Ultra subscribers in the US.

Duet connects across all your work tools

The app works like a to-do list Tinder, suggesting cards you swipe left or right to dismiss or accept. It accesses email, calendar, Google Docs, and Slack to find connections between information.

It spots details you might miss

Duet connected a meeting summary from Gemini in email to a Slack message, and figured out who the reviewer's boss was from a shared Google Doc for weekly one-on-one meetings.

Morning briefings with a neurotic edge

Each morning Duet greets with highlights and to-dos, often offering to help draft messages or add agenda items. But it sometimes feels like interacting with a slightly neurotic personal assistant.

“This sometimes felt like interacting with a slightly neurotic personal assistant”

Duet misses the nuance in tone

When the reviewer emailed an interview subject that an article would go up Tuesday, Duet panicked Tuesday morning that the draft was still being edited. It missed that this was not a hard deadline.

Duet gets the tone right sometimes

When planning ahead, Duet spotted that time off left only a couple of working days before a big draft was due.

The message was tagged with Claude's label

The Slack message Duet drafted was accurate and even funny, shortening signature to sig. But it was tagged with a sent with Claude label, making it obvious the AI wrote it.

Duet wants to help with writing

Duet often volunteered to help start drafts, which the reviewer always declined. It became uncanny when Duet wanted to help review an article about Duet itself.

Knowing Duet watches everything feels strange

The reviewer opted in to share all email, drafts, and Slack messages with Duet. But seeing it in practice raised questions about whether knowing an AI watches everything would change how people work.

AI lacks the judgment of a real person

A person can pick up on nuances in tone, understand communication norms, and be tactful. AI overall is not good at understanding nuance or tone, and it is not clear if it ever will be.

Duet works best as a backstop

The reviewer likes Duet for finding overlooked discrepancies across emails, messages, and docs. But dislikes it in the creative process, wanting to find her own ways into topics.

Missing the legwork means missing discovery

If you send a robot to do the legwork, you miss the opportunity to stumble across something unexpected. That stumbling is part of what makes the work enjoyable.

“If you send a robot to do the legwork, you miss the opportunity to stumble across something unexpected.”