Anthropic merges its Claude chat and agentic Cowork products into a single AI assistant as part of a push to build an AI superapp

Anthropic is consolidating its two AI tools, Claude Chat and Claude Cowork, into a single product as it seeks to create an "AI superapp." This new unified assistant, introduced on Wednesday, will also feature Claude Docs and Claude Slides in beta, along with an enhanced Claude Design tool that will be accessible within every conversation.

The company aims to simplify the user experience by allowing Claude to select the appropriate tools and retain the thread of a task, rather than requiring users to manually switch between separate tools. This approach aligns with an industry trend of developing AI "everything apps" designed to replace multiple specialized products for various tasks such as searching, writing, coding, and managing files.

The shift is particularly significant for enterprise customers who want to centralize and control their employees' AI usage. Notably, Claude Code, Anthropic's coding-focused product, will remain separate for now. While this consolidation could streamline the user experience, it may also increase costs due to the higher token consumption of agentic tasks performed by Claude Cowork, compared to simple chat exchanges.

Anthropic's new setup allows users to maintain control over Claude's autonomy, with default prompts for confirmation before action. Enterprise administrators can also choose when to enable the beta features for their organizations.