Chinese Show Off AI That Can Work for You All Day Without Supervision
Arkadiy Andrienko
Chinese startup Moonshot AI, known for its chatbot of the same name Kimi, has unveiled the beta of Kimi Work — a local AI agent that works directly with files, the browser, and a task scheduler. Unlike the web version, this is a native app for Windows and macOS. The developers have moved away from the "cloud assistant" concept — here, the agent gains access to the file system and acts like a digital employee you can leave to work unattended.
Kimi Work comes with a built‑in WebBridge module — a combination of a local service and an extension for Chrome or Edge. The agent controls the browser via the Chrome DevTools Protocol: opening tabs, scrolling pages, clicking elements, filling out forms, and extracting data. You give it a task, and Kimi builds a multi‑step plan and executes it. Plus, cookies and session data never leave your computer — Moonshot’s servers don’t get access to your logged‑in tabs.
The agent works with local files in a similar way. The app monitors specified folders, can read documents, create new ones, edit spreadsheets and PDFs. By default, an “Ask before acting” safeguard is enabled, and before any modification or overwrite, the program asks for permission. You can turn off the mode, but the basic protection remains the factory setting. For complex analytical tasks, Kimi Work can spin up to 300 specialized agents in parallel, each handling its own piece of work, and upon completion, the results are compiled into a single document. The developers demonstrate this with PowerPoint presentations or Excel reports: sub‑agents simultaneously process different sources, aggregate data, and the user gets the finished file in seconds.
The agent comes with a built‑in task scheduler — you can have Kimi Work run Python scripts, call the language model, or process datasets strictly on a schedule.
The release of Kimi Work fits into the desktop agent race: Anthropic launched Claude Cowork, and OpenAI is preparing its own Codex app, which will also have agent‑like capabilities. The app is already available for download, supporting Windows and macOS with Apple Silicon processors.
Are you ready to trust a desktop agent with round‑the‑clock access to your files and browser, or would you rather handle tasks manually? Share your thoughts in the comments.
