AI Browsers: The Next Frontier in Web Interaction and Job Automation

Could OpenAI's rumored browser be a Chrome-killer? Here's what I'm expecting

Sometime soon, perhaps as early as next week, OpenAI will follow up on its release of ChatGPT agent with its AI-enabled web browser. Officially, neither OpenAI nor its usually chatty CEO, Sam Altman, has anything to say about this browser. Unofficially, it's an open secret that the company is working on one to compete not just with the already shipping AI-enabled web browsers, Perplexity Comet, and Dia, but with the 800-pound gorilla of web browsers, Google Chrome. Why? Just look at ChatGPT agent. For all of the usual AI agent tricks in its bag, such as ordering groceries or booking meetings, it's still an external program that runs its own computer to handle "complex tasks from start to finish," with a "visual browser that interacts with the web." Behind the scenes, it leverages Operator's ability to interact with websites, Deep Research's skill in synthesizing information, and ChatGPT's intelligence and conversational fluency to deliver good answers. Also: 5 entry-level tech jobs AI is already augmenting, according to Amazon As Altman said at a May 2025 Sequoia Capital event, people use ChatGPT differently depending on age: "Older people use ChatGPT as a Google replacement", while "people in their 20s and 30s use it like a life advisor" and "people in college use it as an operating system." To do any of these, whether you're a Boomer, GenX, Millennial, or Generation Alpha, you use a browser. So it makes perfect sense for OpenAI to offer a dedicated web browser. Today, most of us use our web browsers for all our work. How many tabs do you have open right now? Would you rather open another, separate program or just stay in your browser? Yeah, me too. I'd rather stay in the browser. Therefore, what I expect the program to look like is a Chromium-based web browser -- because it's what everyone outside of Mozilla uses now -- with a fully integrated AI assistant. This will combine everything that the current assistant offers with full browser integration. So, for example, just like Comet already does, it will be able to pull data from your open tabs to give better responses to your requests. Also: Too many open browser tabs? This is still my favorite solution - and has been for years In addition, since Chromium is a de facto industry standard, OpenAI won't have to reinvent the browser wheel. It will also make it easier for OpenAI's browser to support existing websites, extensions, and web apps. That way, its developers can focus on integrating advanced AI features. Early reports purporting to come from developers and beta releases suggest it will also include features such as AI-generated summaries of articles, videos, and PDFs, and support for images, voice, and files, building on capabilities seen in GPT-4o. In addition, beyond traditional autofill, the browser is purported to be able to intelligently complete forms and schedule tasks based on user intent. For example, I use different email accounts for business and personal use. Theoretically, it would know to use my work account for my Delta and Marriott travel reservations, but my personal account for my Amazon orders. By owning the browser, OpenAI will get access not just to user questions, but pretty much all user behavior and data. Historically, that's been the cornerstone of Google's business model, and OpenAI, and all the other AI companies, would love to grab that brass ring as well. Also: 5 reasons why I still prefer Perplexity over every other AI chatbot In turn, that means the more access OpenAI gets to your data, the less you'll be giving to Google or other third parties. That's a win-win from where Altman sits. As for its AI browser competitors, OpenAI's strategy appears to be about embedding AI as the user's digital proxy. In the best of all possible worlds, you'll get up in the morning, and start working and playing with OpenAI until the close of the day. Comet with Perplexity, on the other hand, has a more traditional take. It's a browser for deep researchers and professionals, with an emphasis on summarization, contextual understanding, source citing, and cross-tab automation. It replaces traditional search with Perplexity's own answer engine. Also: AI's biggest impact on your workforce is still to come - 3 ways to avoid getting left behind Dia is a ground-up rebuild with AI as the default mode of interaction. It promises a "workspace OS," where AI proactively manages workflows, recalls session history, suggests next actions, and contextualizes intent. With it, you're not so much browsing as you're letting it drive you to your destinations and answers. Let's not forget Google has a horse in this race, too. Google's approach is incremental but ambitious. It's been embedding conversational AI into daily browsing while avoiding sudden, disruptive changes. For example, Gemini in Chrome has brought conversational AI directly into the browser interface. With it, you can now invoke Google's Gemini right from the current web page if you have one of Google's AI subscriptions: The $20-per-month Google AI Pro plan or the $250-per-month Google AI Ultra plan. However, it's unlikely that Google will integrate AI as deeply into its browsers as other companies will. You must remember that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is still pushing Google to divest Chrome. Integrating AI deeply into Chrome won't help its case. Indeed, it's possible OpenAI might end up buying Chrome. Of course, Microsoft is even more all-in on AI in its programs. Microsoft Edge is now a Copilot-native browser. Users can access Copilot with a single click from the sidebar or by typing @copilot in the address bar, turning the browser into a real-time AI assistant that can answer questions, summarize pages, and help with creative tasks, all without leaving the current tab. Also: Coding with AI? My top 5 tips for vetting its output - and staying out of trouble As you also almost certainly know, AI is now baked into Windows 11. Microsoft started building AI into Windows in 2023. These days, Copilot is such an integral part of Windows that with Copilot Vision on Windows 10 and 11, it can look over your virtual shoulder at everything on your screen to help you work. Need I add that at this point, if you use any of these programs, you can kiss your privacy goodbye? That said, which will be best for you? Personally, I prefer Perplexity and Comet, but it's too early to say for certain. AI programs change so quickly that it's almost impossible to keep up with them. I wouldn't commit to any of them at this point. I would, on the other hand, kick their tires. Chances are you'll be using one of them sometime soon.

Perplexity's Comet is the AI browser Google wants

Emma Roth is a news writer who covers the streaming wars, consumer tech, crypto, social media, and much more. Previously, she was a writer and editor at MUO. Perplexity has just launched its agentic answer to Google Chrome -- it's called Comet, and it knocked out a slate of tasks on my behalf, though I think I could've done some faster myself. The new AI-powered browser is currently only available to Perplexity Max subscribers or through an early access waitlist, and it's supposed to simplify the way you browse the web by infusing AI into practically everything you do. For one, it replaces Google Search results with its Perplexity AI "answer engine," which appears in your browser window when you type a query into the address bar. Unlike your typical search engine, Perplexity will first surface links to relevant websites and then generate information about what you're looking for. Comet's distilled search results come in handy when you want it to narrow down your results for you, but it's a bit jarring not to see the massive selection of websites suggested by Google. Comet also comes with an AI assistant built in, similar to the Gemini integration that Google is testing in Chrome. Selecting the Assistant button in the top-right corner of the browser will open up a sidebar with a chat interface. From here, you can type in a query or use voice mode to chat about different topics, as well as ask specific questions about the webpage you're on. Comet can generate a summary of an article, describe an image, summarize YouTube videos, or perform more research about a topic that catches your eye. It's also able to scan all of your open tabs to provide summaries of those pages and compare products on them. At this point, these are all pretty standard features for an AI tool, but what makes Comet really stand out is its ability to complete tasks on your behalf. After linking my Google account to the browser, I found that it was frighteningly fast at generating -- and sending -- an email to myself containing a summary of this year's hurricane season outlook. The browser also speedily complied with a request to close all the tabs I hadn't opened in more than 15 minutes. It even wrote and published a post on my X account on my behalf about the upcoming Made by Google event. I asked it to unsubscribe from the promotional emails sent by Fubo and Fanatics.com as well. I watched as Comet's AI assistant walked itself through the process. In the chat interface, Comet shows what it's "seeing" as it locates recent emails sent by the companies, finds the unsubscribe button, and then actually selects it. I even had Comet go through my list of LinkedIn invites and accept requests from people with five or more mutual connections. The browser once again traced its own process of going through my invites, identifying which ones met my threshold for mutual connections, and then hitting Accept. But as I had Comet perform these tasks, I couldn't help but think it'd be faster if I did them myself. It took Comet two minutes to unsubscribe from receiving emails from those two providers, but it only took me a little over 30 seconds to unsubscribe from the same ones (yes, I timed myself). Comet also ate up a chunk of time when accepting a couple of LinkedIn invitations, a task I could do in just a couple of clicks. I can see it serving as a great accessibility tool, as well as a way to complete tasks in the background while you're doing something else. You can unlock even more agentic features when you start a prompt with "take control of my browser." I didn't realize this until I contacted Perplexity to ask when the browser would be capable of booking reservations or buying products. Without this phrase, Comet will stop short of completing these tasks and instead provide instructions on how you can do it manually. To start, I asked Comet to "take control of my browser" and summarize the comments on a Verge article. Instead of denying my request because it couldn't read the collapsed comments section (like Gemini in Chrome did), Comet worked around this and opened the comments section itself. It summed up the sentiment surrounding my colleague Vee's cursed piece about Grok's AI anime waifu, calling users' reaction to the chatbot overwhelmingly "negative and critical." I took things a step further by asking Comet to take control of my browser, add aquarium sand and glue for an iPad repair to my cart on Amazon, and then check out. The process was surprisingly seamless, as I watched it acknowledge the total price, choose Prime's one-day shipping speed, select my default payment option, and hit "order" without needing me to intervene. I only ran into some hiccups when having Comet book me a reservation for a restaurant. When I finally found a restaurant that accepts online reservations, I once again asked the browser to take control and make a reservation for me on a specific date. It completed the task, only it never asked for my email or phone number, and instead entered a generic placeholder for both. I was able to have Comet rebook with my actual email address, but it shows that the browser might not get everything right all the time. "Some of the more complicated agentic actions like shopping do have a higher failure rate than simpler tasks, but this is actually a limitation of current AI models," Perplexity spokesperson Jesse Dwyer told The Verge. "So this will only get easier and better in Comet." Still, Comet can do far more than Chrome's Gemini integration, and it's exactly the type of tool that Google has set its sights on creating. Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas has made it clear that the startup wants to challenge Google's dominance, and Comet may play a big role in bringing it up to speed.

The rise of AI browsers is shaking up the web -- here's why it matters

AI is changing how we interact with the internet, and it's happening faster than most people realize. As tools like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini provide instant answers without requiring users to click through to websites, the ripple effects are starting to show. I've pointed to a steep decline in traffic for major publishers because of advanced AI overviews and chatbots hopping paywalls, suggesting that the traditional, ad-supported model of the open web is under pressure. The worry is that if no one's clicking, then no one's paying, and that puts the future of free, high-quality content at risk. At the same time, a new generation of AI browsers is starting to emerge. OpenAI, Perplexity, Opera and others are building browsers that go beyond simply displaying web pages. These tools are designed to function more like intelligent assistants becaues they can summarize content, complete tasks and guide users through multi-step processes like booking a reservation or comparing products across tabs. OpenAI is reportedly developing a browser based on Chromium with GPT-4o integration. It's expected to offer task automation, tab management and AI-powered content summarization. Perplexity's Comet browser, currently available, takes a similar approach but is gated behind a premium subscription. Opera's AI browser leans into privacy, offering local-agent capabilities that aim to keep user data on-device while still providing intelligent support. These features can be helpful, especially for users looking to get things done more efficiently. But they also raise big questions. If AI can provide an answer without sending monetizable traffic to the original source, what happens to the websites that created that content in the first place? This represents a shift in the long-standing structure of the web. For years, the exchange was simple: users got access to free information, and publishers got paid through ads and affiliate links. If AI bypasses that interaction, the balance starts to fall apart. The idea of "surfing the web" is being replaced by something more passive and curated. Instead of typing a query and scanning a list of results, users might soon ask their AI browser a question and receive a synthesized answer pulled from multiple sources, often without visiting any of them. These AI browsers are reframing the internet as a kind of workspace, where information is delivered on demand and most of the heavy lifting is handled in the background. It's a shift in how we find and engage with information, and it could change the way users experience the web entirely. There are also growing concerns about privacy. While Opera has taken a more transparent, local approach, many AI tools still rely on cloud processing. That opens the door to user data being collected, stored and potentially used to train future models. As AI browsers become more capable and more integrated into our daily lives, the trade-offs between convenience and privacy are likely to get more complicated. On top of that, regulatory questions are piling up. The U.S. Department of Justice is already looking into Google Chrome's market dominance, and lawsuits around AI data scraping are picking up steam. Some companies, like Perplexity, are experimenting with revenue-sharing models for publishers, but it's not yet clear whether those efforts will be enough to support the kind of content people rely on. AI browsers are poised to change the way we use the internet and that includes how we access information, what we trust and how we support the sites we visit. Whether this shift ultimately hurts or helps the web depends on how companies, publishers and users respond to the changes ahead.

This AI browser may replace 2 office jobs you thought were safe, and it's coming for your job next

Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas introduces Comet, an AI-powered browser poised to automate knowledge work. Comet aims to replace administrative assistants and recruiters by handling tasks like candidate sourcing, scheduling, and email management. While currently invite-only, Comet signals a significant shift in office work, sparking debate among tech leaders about AI's role in job replacement versus augmentation. Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas claims that a new AI-powered browser can replace two critical office roles. A new AI-powered browser called Comet is causing controversy in the tech world. Unlike a chatbot, this browser is designed to perform actual tasks rather than just answering questions. The CEO of Perplexity claims that two white-collar jobs that every business depends on could be replaced by his AI browser. According to CEO it is coming for administrative assistants and recruiters, two positions that are essential to any modern workplace. Srinivas described how his company's new AI-native browser, Comet, is intended to completely automate knowledge work in addition to facilitating web browsing on Thursday's episode of The Verge's "Decoder" podcast. He explained how Comet's integrated AI agent can access applications such as Google Calendar, LinkedIn, and Gmail to create candidate lists, retrieve contact details, and send customized outreach emails, tasks that are normally performed by sourcers and recruiting coordinators, as per a report by Business Insider. Aravind Srinivas claims the company's new AI browser, Comet, can replace recruiters and executive assistants by automating almost all of their day-to-day tasks. While still invite-only, Comet is intended to perform white-collar tasks continuously in the background, indicating a rapidly approaching shift in office work as we know it. According to Srinivas, Comet can handle a lot of an executive assistant's daily responsibilities, such as calendar management, meeting preparation, and email triage. "A recruiter's work worth one week is just one prompt: sourcing and reach outs," he stated. "You want it to keep following up, keep a track of their responses," he stated. "If some people respond, go and update the Google Sheets, mark the status as responded or in progress, and follow up with those candidates, sync with my Google calendar, and then resolve conflicts and schedule a chat, and then push me a brief ahead of the meeting." According to Srinivas, Comet will eventually develop into an AI operating system for white-collar workers, one that can carry out commands from natural language prompts and run tasks continuously in the background. Srinivas wagers that people will pay for AI that performs useful tasks, even though Comet is still invite-only and only accessible by premium users, as per a report by Business Insider. Whether AI will replace or reinvent white-collar jobs is a topic of debate among tech leaders. According to Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, within five years, AI may replace 50% of entry-level positions. This opinion was echoed by Jim Farley, the CEO of Ford, who stated at the Aspen Ideas Festival last month that artificial intelligence will replace literally half of all white-collar workers in the United States. ALSO READ: Dylan Dreyer and Husband Brian Fichera Quietly Separate After 13 Years Together Instead of framing AI as a replacement engine, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff presented it as an augmentation tool. AI will change jobs, but it will change everyone's, it has changed mine, according to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. There is widespread agreement that change is occurring quickly and that workers must adapt or risk becoming obsolete, even among more optimistic voices. In order to prevent the company's white-collar workforce from being reduced by generative AI, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy advised staff members to educate themselves, participate in workshops, receive training, and use and experiment with AI whenever feasible, reported Business Insider. What is Comet, and what jobs might it replace? Comet is an AI-powered browser that replaces recruiters and assistants by handling outreach, scheduling, and administrative tasks. Is Comet available to the public yet? Not entirely, it is currently invite-only and restricted to premium users.

Forget Chatbots -- Perplexity's Aravind Srinivas Says The Real AI Disruption Is In The Browser And It's Coming For Office Jobs

Enter your email to get Benzinga's ultimate morning update: The PreMarket Activity Newsletter Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas believes the future of AI won't be driven by chatbots, but by intelligent browsers that can fully automate key white-collar roles. What Happened: Speaking on The Verge's Decoder podcast on Thursday, Srinivas introduced Comet, Perplexity's new AI-native browser designed to function as a full-fledged knowledge worker. Unlike typical AI assistants, Comet integrates directly with workplace apps like Gmail, LinkedIn and Google Calendar to perform high-value tasks -- everything from sourcing candidates to managing meeting schedules. "A recruiter's work worth one week is just one prompt: sourcing and reach outs," Srinivas said, describing how Comet can automatically generate candidate lists, pull contact info and send tailored outreach emails. See Also: Bill Gates Is Betting Two-Thirds Of His Foundation's Portfolio In These 3 Stocks He added that the browser can even follow up, update spreadsheets, sync calendars, resolve scheduling conflicts and prep briefs ahead of meetings. Srinivas said he envisions Comet evolving into an AI operating system for professionals that works continuously in the background, executing natural language commands. He argued that Comet could effectively replace two key office roles: recruiters and executive assistants. "You want it to keep following up, keep a track of their responses," he said. "At scale, if it helps you to make a few million bucks, does it not make sense to spend $2,000 for that prompt?" This news was first spotted by Business Insider. Why It's Important: Earlier this month, ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood raised concerns about rising unemployment, particularly among recent college graduates, as AI increasingly displaces entry-level jobs. She cited The Wall Street Journal, she noted the unemployment rate for new grads has risen from 4% to over 6%. Wood advised job seekers to focus on learning AI-related skills to stay competitive. Last month, the Kobeissi Letter pointed out that the difference between Americans who believe jobs are "plentiful" and those who say they're "hard to get" has shrunk to just 11.1% -- the smallest margin since 2017, aside from the COVID-19 period. Craig Shapiro previously warned that AI could disrupt 25% of all jobs by 2030 -- a challenge he believes the Federal Reserve has little ability to address. Previously, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang urged students to embrace AI to enhance their career prospects and productivity. At the same time, Microsoft Corporation has laid off 9,000 employees in its second wave of 2025 job cuts -- impacting under 4% of its workforce -- as it manages costs while investing $80 billion in AI data centers. Read Next: Dan Ives Urges Apple 'To Make A Move,' Saying That Perplexity Acquisition Is 'A No-Brainer': 'It's A Matter Of When And Not If' Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. Photo courtesy: Shutterstock Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs

Why Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas sees AI browsers as key to AI agents

Comet integrates Perplexity's AI assistant directly into browsing, enabling smarter workflows and autonomous digital actions. For most people, the browser is a passive tool - a window into the web. But for Aravind Srinivas, co-founder and CEO of Perplexity, the browser is something much more radical: the future home of true AI agents. In a recent episode of The Verge's Decoder podcast, Srinivas laid out his bold vision for Comet, Perplexity's new AI-powered browser that blurs the line between user and agent. Unlike Chrome or Safari, Comet isn't just where you go to consume content, it's where work gets done for you. As Srinivas put it, "The browser is the most agentic software that we use every day. It has your login state. It has all the pages you're on. It's the most powerful surface area where AI can actually take actions for you." To him, the browser isn't just a tool, it's infrastructure for intelligence. Also read: Meet Comet, Perplexity's new AI browser: How's it different? Comet builds on Perplexity's core search technology but goes further: it embeds an AI assistant directly into a Chromium-based browser. This assistant lives in a sidebar, analyzing your browsing context, summarizing information, scheduling meetings, shopping on your behalf, even drafting emails all through natural language prompts. This isn't a chatbot slapped onto a search engine. It's a rethink of the entire browser experience. "This assistant is not something that just passively responds," Srinivas explained. "It's something that looks at your context and says: okay, here's what I think you should do." That proactive quality, AI that takes initiative rather than simply answering, is what Srinivas believes separates agents from assistants. It's also what he believes legacy tech companies can't deliver anytime soon. "I don't think Google can copy Comet very quickly," he noted, pointing out the complexity and risk involved in cannibalizing their own ad model. "It's not a chatbot. It's a new category." Perplexity already offers a compelling answer-based search experience, backed by real-time web sources and clean citations. With over 30 million users and a valuation that reportedly exceeds $18 billion, it's one of the fastest-growing AI companies in the space. But search, according to Srinivas, is only phase one. Also read: Open AI's Aura AI browser: How will it compete with Google Chrome? Comet moves from finding information to doing something with it. Want to buy a flight, compare laptops, or email a PDF to your boss? The assistant can perform those tasks without switching tabs or copying and pasting between apps. "We're not just building a product, we're building a new way of interacting with the internet," Srinivas said. He imagines a future where the browser evolves into a "personal OS" - a layer that sits across devices, platforms, and tasks. This assistant won't just read the web with you. It will run errands. Srinivas is candid about the tension between agentic computing and the ad-based business model that fuels companies like Google. In his view, AI agents pose a fundamental threat to that ecosystem. "Google's business model depends on making people click on ads. But AI agents will reduce clicks," he explained. "So they're stuck." While Google experiments cautiously with AI summaries and products like Gemini, Perplexity is already shipping aggressive changes. Comet is available to Max plan users ($200/month) in a closed beta, with plans for broader rollout later. According to Srinivas, Perplexity is also exploring usage-based pricing for "high-ROI tasks" like shopping decisions, legal research, or automating workflows, where saving a few hours could be worth hundreds of dollars to the user. Other startups are circling the idea of an AI-native browser. Arc has its own assistant. Rewind is working on memory tools. OpenAI is rumored to be building a browser under the codename Mariner. But Srinivas believes Comet's full-stack approach, answer engine, assistant, and browser, all tightly integrated, gives it a major head start. "It's not easy to bolt AI onto a browser. You need deep integration, real context awareness, and strong incentives to keep improving it. That's why I think Big Tech can't just replicate this." In his mind, we're at the start of a shift as big as the one from desktop to mobile. The interface of the future isn't touchscreens or voice, it's intent. Users won't need to navigate menus or tabs. They'll describe their goal, and the AI will figure out the rest. Ultimately, Srinivas sees Comet not just as a better browser, but as a replacement for how we currently use the web. AI won't just assist, it will act, understand and respond. "It's not just about replacing search," he said. "It's about replacing the whole way you use the web." The stakes are high, the competition fierce, but if Srinivas is right, the future won't be about what you click. It'll be about what gets done.