Meta launched Muse on September 8, a consumer AI agent built to carry out everyday tasks on a user's behalf rather than just answer questions. The app is rolling out today in the U.S. on iOS and Android, with web access at Muse.ai and an option to message the agent directly through WhatsApp.

What Muse can do

According to Meta and reporting from Bloomberg, Axios and TechCrunch, Muse can open a browser, fill out forms and act on a person's behalf to complete multi-step chores: buying movie tickets, booking travel, scheduling a tennis lesson, filling out a class field-trip permission slip, or sending an email. Users can also hand Muse a broader goal — like planning a trip — and have it assemble a step-by-step plan rather than a single answer. The launch is Meta's most concrete step yet toward Mark Zuckerberg's stated goal of giving every person a "personal superintelligence" assistant that acts, not just chats.

A dedicated secure environment

Meta is leaning heavily on security and privacy framing for the launch. Muse runs on a purpose-built virtual machine Meta calls Muse Secure VM, which SiliconANGLE reports houses both the agent and the user's data together, isolated from the rest of Meta's infrastructure, rather than executing tasks on a user's own device. The agent itself is powered by Muse Spark, Meta's agentic model, and Meta says privacy protections — such as limiting what data the agent can access and retain — are built into that core rather than added on top. The company is betting this framing helps offset a trust problem: giving an AI agent standing access to email, calendars, payment methods and shopping accounts is a materially bigger ask than a chatbot that only answers questions in a browser tab.

Why it matters

Muse puts Meta in direct competition with the growing field of "does things for you" consumer agents from OpenAI, Google and a wave of well-funded startups, and does so days after Meta agreed to an $18 billion multistate settlement over social-media harms — a backdrop TechCrunch notes makes public trust in a new data-hungry Meta product an open question. Whether Muse succeeds will likely turn less on its task-completion ability, which is already table stakes among agentic assistants, than on whether consumers are willing to connect the accounts — payments, email, shopping — that let it actually act rather than just plan.