OpenAI Releases Dots, an Always-On Assistant Inside ChatGPT
The background agent watches your calendar and email and suggests work to do, but it needs a $100 a month plan.
OpenAI's new assistant, called dots, keeps working in the background without being asked, according to TechCrunch. OpenAI released it at its developer day in late September, and it is available in the ChatGPT desktop and mobile apps.
Once you connect your calendar, email, computer and other tools, dots tries to help get work done. A proactive research feature periodically reviews what it knows about you and what it can access, then proposes ways to help. TechCrunch reports that dots grew out of OpenAI's coding agents, and that the same results are possible with OpenAI's Codex app, but with more setup and hand-holding.
Access is limited to the Pro tier or higher, with plans starting at $100 a month. In TechCrunch's testing, dots flagged calendar conflicts and deadlines, but not always in time. OpenAI's Alexander Embiricos said that in an early case it warned him only three minutes before a conflict.
Controls are still basic. You get the same privacy options as ChatGPT, including turning off model training, but TechCrunch says access to computer resources is not granular, and the app refuses read-only access to cloud drives. OpenAI used cautious defaults at launch, so dots asks permission often, and Embiricos said the company plans to tune that and add finer controls.
If you already pay for a higher ChatGPT tier, try dots on a low-risk setup, such as calendar and email only, and see whether its suggestions save you time. Hold off on giving it broad computer access until the controls improve.
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