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ChatGPT takes a major step toward becoming a full-fledged personal assistant with the release of a new feature called Tasks. This could indicate that OpenAI will release more agents in the future.
Currently in beta, Tasks allows ChatGPT Plus, Team, and Pro users to schedule actions in advance.
For example, if someone wants to receive project reminders or daily weather updates, they can request ChatGPT, which will notify them of the chosen date and time. Tasks can be recurring or one-time reminders.
To set up a task, users must toggle “4o with scheduled tasks” on the template switcher and write a reminder prompt. ChatGPT can also suggest tasks from previous conversations.
Tasks work with all versions of ChatGPT and send notifications via desktop, web, and mobile. However, users can only access the task manager on the web version of ChatGPT.
OpenAI said the beta period will help its researchers “understand how people use tasks and refine the feature before making it available to all ChatGPT users.”
Tasks join other wizard-like features for ChatGPT. At its “12 Days of OpenAI” event in December, OpenAI started screen sharingallowing users to open ChatGPT while reading a text message and asking it to help them respond.
The first OpenAI agent?
Rumors around OpenAI’s release of an AI agent swirled when some users caught ChatGPT providing access to scheduled tasks as early as December. The agent, called Operator, would be the first agent of the company.
People thought Tasks could be the precursor to Operator. User @kimmonismusaka “Chubby”, said: “The information This seems correct and everything is preparing for the release of ‘Operator’, i.e. the OpenAI agent. The ‘Tasks’ feature found by Tibor seems to be the first significant step in preparing Operator. It’s debatable whether we’ll have a release this month or just a preview.
VentureBeat contacted OpenAI about the tasks and the operator. The company declined to answer the question and only said that Tasks “will be an important step in making ChatGPT a more useful AI companion.”
OpenAI has already made its first foray into agent space with Swarma framework he released to help orchestrate AI agents.
Making ChatGPT a better assistant
If you’re like me, you probably use the Reminders app and Google Calendar too much to remind you to text a loved one Happy Birthday or your brunch plans, or to alert you of news embargoes and scheduled interviews .
There are many reminder, calendar, and productivity apps available for consumers and businesses. These include Google Calendar, Outlook Calendar, Asana, Trello and Notion. The productivity assistant space has no shortage of apps that remind individuals and teams of the tasks they need to accomplish.
OpenAI’s big play in such a crowded space is interesting, especially since most people don’t think of chatbots as scheduling assistants. But ChatGPT already streamlines the process allowing users to migrate their coding or writing tasks to the platform or search the web without leaving the chat interface. ChatGPT even opens the door to developers IDE almost automatically for them.
As ChatGPT adds more actions to its platform, setting up scheduled tasks and reminders isn’t so far-fetched. This makes ChatGPT a viable contender for many productivity and scheduling apps.
