Claude Cowork agent expands to mobile and web with cross-device task continuity

Anthropic’s Claude Cowork, initially launched as a desktop app in January, is now available on web and mobile for Max subscribers, expanding its agentic capabilities beyond coding-focused workflows. The update enables users to start a task on their desktop, receive status updates on their phone, and resume work later even if their laptop is closed, positioning Cowork as a persistent, cross-device assistant.

The company describes the expansion as a move to position Cowork less as a coding tool and more as an 'agentic administrative coworker' that can operate in the background, follow users across devices, and request human input when decisions require user judgment. This mirrors a broader industry trend where AI firms are pushing agents into the surfaces where work actually happens, rather than limiting them to chat interfaces or coding tasks.

Anthropic provided early usage data from 1.2 million anonymized and aggregated Cowork sessions across more than 600,000 organizations collected during the last two weeks of May. The data suggests that software development accounted for only 8.7% of sessions, while the largest category—33.4%—was business process operations such as compiling reports, building onboarding checklists, and reconciling spreadsheets. Content creation and copywriting represented 16.4% of sessions, including tasks like drafting slide decks, social media posts, and proposals. These patterns indicate that the most common uses for Cowork are administrative and operational rather than strictly technical.

Anthropic frames the expansion as part of a strategy to demonstrate where AI agents deliver value in daily work, emphasizing that success depends on embedding agents into the tools and workflows people already use. The company also notes that bringing Cowork to web and mobile broadens access beyond users who installed the desktop app, while unifying chat and Cowork experiences across platforms. The desktop app remains the primary environment for deep work involving local files and browser access.