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Getting started

Everything you need to work with Agent Cowork on the web, on your computer and in your browser. Read it in order, or jump to what you need.

Where to use it

One account and one monthly allowance work everywhere. Pick the place that fits the task.

  • Web at agentcowork.net: chat, documents, websites and images, with nothing to install.
  • Desktop app for Windows and Mac: works with the files on your computer, runs commands, uses your browser and makes videos.
  • CLI for the terminal: the same agent inside your code projects. See the CLI guide.
  • Agent Cowork for Chrome: lets the desktop app and the CLI open, read and use web pages in Chrome.

Install

Mac

Download Agent Cowork for Mac (macOS 13 or later). Choose Apple Silicon for an M-series Mac, or Intel for an Intel Mac. Open the downloaded file, drag Agent Cowork into your Applications folder, then open it from Applications. Keep it there: updates can only install themselves when the app lives in Applications.

Closing the window keeps Agent Cowork running in the Dock. Click the Dock icon to reopen it, or press Cmd+Q to quit.

Windows

Download the Windows installer (Windows 10 or later, 64-bit) and run it. If Windows shows a SmartScreen warning, choose More info, then Run anyway.

On first launch the app sets up its tools in the background, including the video tools. Keep it open with internet access until setup finishes.

Sign in

Open the app and choose Sign in with your browser. Your browser opens agentcowork.net; sign in there and approve the connection. Your password is only ever entered on the website. The CLI works the same way withagent login.

Plans and usage

Every plan has one monthly allowance, shared across web, desktop and CLI. How fast it goes depends on the work: long tasks, large files and media use more. In the desktop app, Settings, Usage shows what is left as a percentage and when it renews. Compare plans on the pricing page.

In Billing you can add a top-up from $5. Your monthly allowance is used first; a top-up is shown separately and carries forward while your paid subscription is active.

A plan change that needs payment stays pending until the payment completes. You can follow its status in Billing.

The web app

Start a chat at agentcowork.net and describe what you need: a document, a website, a presentation, research or images.

  • It keeps a job list. Everything you ask for in a chat goes on the list, and the chat does not finish while an item is still open.
  • Files appear as cards. Open one to preview it. A website opens as the live page, with desktop, laptop, tablet and phone sizes, Edit for changing text, colours and images, Open full screen, and a download with its images included.
  • Video production runs in the desktop app, because editing and rendering happen on your computer. Ask for a video on the web and you get a card with the download link.

Connected apps follow the approval you chose for each of them. Sensitive actions, such as deleting, sending, publishing or paying, always ask first unless you chose to always allow them.

Projects and folders

In the desktop app you work inside a project folder. When you send the first message of a new chat, Agent Cowork asks Where should this chat work?

  • New folder in your project (recommended): the chat gets its own folder, named after your request. You can rename it before you start.
  • The project folder itself: the chat works next to the project's existing files.
  • Another folder: pick any folder on your computer.

Tick Always use my choice to skip the question. You can change it later in Settings, Privacy and safety, New chats. In the sidebar, chats stay grouped under their project. The agent keeps scripts, drafts and test renders in a work subfolder, so the chat folder shows your deliveries first.

How the agent works

Describe the task in your own words. Agent Cowork then:

  • writes a short note before each group of actions, so you can follow what it is doing;
  • keeps a checklist of everything you asked for and ticks items off as they are delivered;
  • keeps going until every item is done, so you do not need to type "continue";
  • ends with a short answer and your files.

While it works, one card shows its progress. When the work is done, the card goes away and only the deliveries stay in the chat. If it stops with a problem, the card stays so you can see why.

Built-in tools

The desktop app gives the agent these tools out of the box. You do not call them yourself: describe the result you want and the agent picks the tools.

  • Files and commands: read, search and edit the files of your project, and run its commands (install, build, test). Your approval setting decides what asks first.
  • Documents: read PDF, Word, Excel, CSV and PowerPoint files; create and edit Word documents, spreadsheets and presentations; make and open zip archives; print designed pages to PDF with page previews.
  • Web: search the web and read pages, with the sources in the answer.
  • Browser, with the Chrome extension: open pages, read them, click, type and fill in forms, take screenshots, check the console and network, and download files. Websites it builds are opened and checked at phone, tablet, laptop and desktop widths, and a brand's colours can be read from its logo or site.
  • Media: search and pick stock photos, generate images and video with the services you connect, compose images from your photos and logo, and send files to a connected app. The AI image allowance is shown before paid generation.
  • Video: edit your footage (cuts, subtitles, music, voice) and make animated videos from an idea; everything renders on your computer.
  • Job list and deliveries: the checklist of everything you asked for, the files shown as cards in the chat, and, when a way of working is worth keeping, a proposal to save it as a skill.
  • Reverse engineering (turn on in Settings): study how an existing app works and build an original version of it.

Prototypes you can click through, brand books, websites with live preview and element comments (select a part of the page and describe the change), and the hosting connection are built on these tools.

Your files

Delivered files appear in the chat as cards. Websites open as running pages in the side panel, videos play, and documents, spreadsheets and presentations preview. Each card offers Show in folder, Open and download. Revisions update the same file instead of creating copies.

Approvals

Choose how much the agent may do on its own in Settings, Privacy and safety, Approvals:

  • Read only: the agent reads freely and asks before it edits files or runs commands.
  • Default: edits files and runs commands in the project without asking. Risky commands and paid generation still ask.
  • Full access: also generates paid media without asking. Risky commands, such as deleting folders, force pushes and dropping database tables, still ask.

In the CLI, --dangerously-approve-all runs with no approval at all, risky commands included. See the CLI guide.

When the agent asks, the request appears above the message box. Approve it once, always, or decline it.

Team of agents

In Settings, General, Team of agents splits bigger jobs between helpers: researchers, a builder, an independent checker and a finisher. Quick questions are still answered directly. The chat waits for its helpers and delivers their files in the chat. It is off by default; with it off, a single agent does the whole job.

Video and animation

In the desktop app, ask for a video in plain words: edit your footage into a reel, make an ad, add subtitles and music, or create an animated video from an idea.

  • Animated videos (promos, explainers, reels, animated charts) are planned as scenes. You see a preview sheet and approve it before the final video is rendered.
  • Generated images, video, music and voice come from the services you connect. If several could do the job, Agent Cowork asks which one to use.
  • Finished videos play in the chat and in the side panel.

The video tools install with the app on first launch.

Connectors

Settings, Connectors gives the agent extra tools: services you sign in to, such as image and video generation, and programs or addresses you add yourself. For each connected service, choose Always ask, Allow automatically or Never allow. Paid services use your own account with that service.

Skills

Skills teach the agent how to do specific kinds of work, such as design, documents, video or Arabic writing. A set is included and kept up to date. To add your own, put a folder containing a SKILL.md file in the skills folder; open it from Settings, Skills.

Chrome

Install Agent Cowork for Chrome from the Chrome Web Store. Version 3.0 works on its own, without the desktop app: click its toolbar icon to open the side panel, choose Sign in to Agent Cowork and approve the code on the page that opens.

  • Chat in the side panel. Ask about the page you are on or give it a task. The agent reads the page, clicks, types and opens pages, and shows what it is doing. Recent chats are kept in this browser.
  • It asks before acting for you. Buying, paying, sending, posting, deleting or submitting shows Allow or Don't allow first. Password, one-time code and card fields are never filled.
  • Record your screen. Press Record and pick the whole screen, a window or a tab; turn on the microphone in the account menu to include your voice. Stop from the panel or Chrome's Stop sharing. Recordings save as WebM in Downloads/Agent Cowork/recordings.

With the desktop app, the extension also gives the app's agent a browser: approve this browser once when the app asks, and later connections are automatic while both are running. Settings, Browser shows the status. That agent works in its own Chrome window, so your tabs are left alone. Sign out from the panel's account menu, or remove the extension in Chrome to stop all access.

Remote access

Reach one of your computers from another, the way remote desktop apps do: see its screen, use its mouse and keyboard, answer the agent's requests and send it files. Only computers signed in to your Agent Cowork account can connect; there are no codes to share. The picture goes directly between the two computers, encrypted, and through Agent Cowork's relay only when your networks refuse a direct connection.

On the computer you leave running

  1. Open Settings, Remote access and turn on Allow my other computers to view this one.
  2. Turn on Also allow control to let your other computer use the mouse and keyboard.
  3. Keep Keep this computer awake on: the computer does not go to sleep while Agent Cowork is open, and the screen can still turn off.
  4. Give it a name, such as Office PC, and leave Agent Cowork open. It can be minimised.

On a Mac, choose Allow in System Settings for Accessibility (needed for control) and turn on Agent Cowork under Privacy & Security, Screen & System Audio Recording, then reopen the app.

On the computer you have with you

  1. Open Settings, Remote access. Your other computer is listed as Online; choose View.
  2. A window shows its screen, with its chats on the right: stop a task, or allow and deny its requests from there.
  3. Choose Control to use its mouse and keyboard, and Stop control to take them back. What you copy on one computer can be pasted on the other while you are in control.
  4. Drop a file on the screen, or choose Send a file: it arrives in Downloads, Agent Cowork remote on the other computer.

While someone is connected, a bar at the top of the watched screen says so, with a Disconnect button. A locked computer shows a notice instead of its screen: sign in on it to continue. A computer that is asleep shows Wake; this works when another of your computers with Agent Cowork open is on the same network. To switch remote access off on every computer at once, open your account settings on agentcowork.net and choose Turn off on all computers.

Attachments and voice

Attach PDF, Word, Markdown, text and image files with the attach button, or drop them into the message box. Check the attachment chips before sending. Scanned PDFs need readable text or page images.

The microphone turns speech into text on your computer and adds it to your draft for review. On first use the app downloads a multilingual speech model (about 547 MiB). Language is detected automatically, or choose Arabic, English, French, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Hindi or Chinese in voice settings.

Arabic and right-to-left content

Arabic writing uses natural Standard Arabic by default, or the dialect you ask for. Arabic documents and websites are laid out right to left. Tashkeel is added where it helps pronunciation; ask for full tashkeel when you need it.

Hosting and deployment

Connect your own hosting in the desktop app. Agent Cowork checks what your hosting supports and deploys, or writes a complete deployment guide for your project when it cannot deploy automatically. Read the hosting guide.

API

Any OpenAI-compatible client can use an Agent Cowork key, created in your dashboard, at the address below. List the models your plan includes with GET /v1/models.

API base URL
https://api.agentcowork.net/v1

Updates and languages

  • Web: always up to date.
  • Windows: the app checks for updates by itself. To check now, open Settings, Updates and choose Check for updates.
  • Mac: the app updates itself when it is in your Applications folder. If macOS asks for your Mac password during an update, enter it. If an update does not install, download the latest version from the download page and drag it into Applications.
  • CLI: run agent update.

Updating keeps your chats, settings and skills. The app is available in eleven languages, including Arabic with a right-to-left layout; choose yours in Settings, General.

Need help with billing, your allowance or the app? Open a support ticket and follow the replies in your account.