OpenAI's Agentic Era Begins: ChatGPT Tasks Revolutionizes Scheduling and Reminders

ChatGPT has embarked on a notable transformation toward a personal assistant role, marked by the introduction of a new feature named Tasks. This development could indicate that OpenAI is set to introduce more autonomous agents in the foreseeable future.

Currently in its beta phase, Tasks enables ChatGPT Plus, Team, and Pro users to pre-schedule actions. For instance, users can arrange to receive project reminders or daily weather forecasts by prompting ChatGPT, which then issues notifications at the designated time and date. Users have the option of setting recurring or one-time reminders.

To activate a task, users should switch to the "4o with scheduled tasks" on the model selector and input a reminder prompt. Based on earlier interactions, ChatGPT can also suggest potential tasks. The functionality is available across all versions of ChatGPT, with notifications delivered via desktop, web, and mobile. Nevertheless, the task manager is only accessible through ChatGPT's web interface.

OpenAI has clarified that the beta period is crucial for their researchers to "understand how people use Tasks and refine the feature before making it available to all ChatGPT users."

Tasks augment the array of assistant-like features in ChatGPT. Notably, during its "12 Days of OpenAI" event in December, OpenAI introduced a screen-sharing capability, allowing users to open ChatGPT alongside a text message to request help in crafting responses.

OpenAI’s First Agent?

Speculation about OpenAI launching an AI agent increased when some users noticed ChatGPT providing access to scheduled tasks since December. The rumored agent, called Operator, is tipped to be OpenAI's inaugural agent.

Speculations suggest that Tasks might be a step toward Operator. X user "Chubby" remarked, "The Information seems to be right and everything is being prepared for the release of 'Operator,' i.e., OpenAI's agent. The 'Tasks' function discovered by Tibor seems to be the first significant move in the preparation of Operator. It's unclear if we'll see a release this month or just a preview."

Furthermore, Testing Catalog News on X suggested that Tasks could eventually empower ChatGPT to conduct specific searches, summarize information, navigate websites, access documents, and solve complex problems.

Efforts to gain comments from OpenAI regarding Tasks and Operator were met with no detailed response, except for OpenAI stating that Tasks "will be an important step toward making ChatGPT a more helpful AI companion." OpenAI had previously ventured into the agentic domain through Swarm, a framework created to manage AI agents.

Enhancing ChatGPT as an Assistant

In the busy world of reminders and scheduling apps, OpenAI's move stands out, even as a plethora of similar apps exists, such as Google Calendar, Outlook, Asana, Trello, and Notion. The integration of scheduled tasks in ChatGPT positions it as a strong contender in the productivity app market, despite chatbot platforms not being typically associated with task management.

With ChatGPT's ongoing expansion of actionable features, implementing scheduled tasks and reminders is a feasible enhancement, placing it as a direct competitor to established productivity and scheduling applications.