AI agents widen what workers attempt, not just how fast they work (opens the source in a new tab)
- Perplexity researchers compared the same users on its chat assistant and its autonomous agent from February to May 2026. The agent worked alone far longer per task and paused often to check in, yet users rarely stopped it.
- Counting the human follow-up, agent workflows cut task time by about 87% in their estimate, and users were less often dissatisfied.
- The bigger shift was scope: people handed agents harder, multi-step work outside their own field, and about 23% of agent tasks were ones they never tried with the assistant.
- 87%
- Estimated cut in task time with an agent
- 23%
- Agent tasks never tried with the assistant
Why it matters Dashboards that count hours saved will miss the real change: people stepping into other people's jobs. Managers need to rethink roles, decide who reviews work done outside someone's expertise, and set clear points where a human signs off.
Other side The authors work at Perplexity, studied early power users of their own product and call the magnitudes approximate. Crossing into unfamiliar fields also means more output that its user cannot properly judge.