Anthropic has expanded Claude Cowork, its agent designed for general knowledge work, from desktop to web and mobile, rolling out in beta to Max subscribers first after launching as a desktop app in January. Early usage data from 1.2 million anonymised sessions shows business process work, not coding, dominates how organisations actually use the tool.
How does Dispatch route work across devices?
A feature Anthropic calls Dispatch keeps a single persistent thread open and routes each request to the right engine. Development tasks run in Claude Code, while general knowledge tasks run in Cowork. Claude returns the final result rather than narrating every step.
The framing positions Cowork less as a coding tool and more as an administrative coworker that operates in the background and notifies users only when a decision is needed. In Anthropic’s language, the agent handles the "work around the work."
Does the desktop app still matter?
Anthropic has indicated that the desktop version remains the primary environment for tasks that require local file access and browser control. Web and mobile expand access for people who never installed the app, enabling them to launch and monitor work from a phone or browser. Users can start a task at their desk, check status on their phone, and pick up the finished output later, even with the laptop closed.
What does the usage data show?
Alongside the rollout, Anthropic released early Cowork usage statistics drawn from 1.2 million anonymised sessions across more than 600,000 organisations in the last two weeks of May.
- Business process work, such as reconciling spreadsheets and building reports common in finance, HR, and administration, accounted for 33.4% of sessions.
- Content creation and copywriting made up 16.4%.
- Software development represented just 8.7%.
Anthropic frames these numbers as evidence that everyday business tasks, rather than coding, are where AI agents are gaining the most traction inside organisations.
Where does this sit in the wider industry shift?
The move fits a broader pivot across the AI sector, moving from chatbot interfaces toward the surfaces where work actually gets done. OpenAI is following a similar path with Codex, expanding a coding tool into a general enterprise-work platform aimed at non-developers. The competitive question for both labs is becoming less about who has the best chatbot and more about who owns the environment in which tasks are completed.
Startups are entering the same space. Viktor, for instance, recently raised $75 million to embed an AI coworker inside Slack and Teams. Google is pressing on the same front with its Gemini Spark agentic assistant, and Anthropic has been widening Claude’s reach across office software for months, from integrations with Microsoft Word to enterprise deployments such as KPMG putting Claude in front of 276,000 staff.
What are the security considerations?
Granting a phone remote control over a desktop agent introduces meaningful risk. A manipulated instruction or a phishing link could trigger hard-to-reverse actions on a connected machine. Anthropic’s own guidance urges users to connect these agents only if they trust every app in the chain, a caution worth heeding as autonomous helpers fill more of the office.
FAQ
What is Claude Cowork and where is it now available?
Claude Cowork is Anthropic’s agent for general knowledge work. It launched as a desktop app in January and is now rolling out in beta to web and mobile for Max subscribers, letting users start a task at their desk, check status on their phone, and pick up the finished output later.
What does Dispatch do?
Dispatch keeps a single persistent thread open and routes each request to the right engine. Development tasks run in Claude Code, while general knowledge tasks run in Cowork, and Claude returns the final result rather than narrating every step.
What do the early Cowork usage statistics show?
Across 1.2 million anonymised sessions from more than 600,000 organisations in the last two weeks of May, business process work made up 33.4% of sessions, content creation and copywriting 16.4%, and software development just 8.7%.
Related coverage
Run a free scan to see your AI Visibility Score, SEO rating, and local citation accuracy.