Anthropic shipped something significant this week that deserves more attention than it's been getting.

Claude can now control your Mac. Not figuratively. It can open applications, click through menus, type into fields, browse the web, manage files, and complete tasks autonomously while you step away from your desk.

The feature is called computer use, and it's built into two Claude tools: Claude Cowork (for business tasks) and Claude Code (for developers). It's in research preview now, available to Claude Pro subscribers at $17 per month and Max subscribers at $100 per month.

This is a meaningful shift. Claude went from being an assistant you talk to, to being something closer to a contractor who actually does the work.

How It Works

When you give Claude a task in Cowork or Code, it first tries to use direct connectors to services it already knows, like Slack or Google Calendar. If there isn't a connector available for what you need, it falls back to the computer itself. It can see your screen, move the cursor, click buttons, open apps, type text, and scroll through documents.

Claude asks your permission before accessing any new application. You can stop it at any point. And Anthropic says the system automatically scans for prompt injection attempts (where malicious instructions hidden in a file could trick the AI into doing something unintended).

There's also a companion feature called Dispatch that launched last week and now extends to Claude Code. Dispatch lets you assign Claude a task from your phone. Claude completes it on your Mac while you're elsewhere. You pick up the finished work when you're back at your desk.

What Small Business Owners Could Actually Do With This

The specific use case Anthropic demonstrated: "enter data into a spreadsheet from the contracts files in my Google Drive, format it, and then save it to a folder." You give the command. Claude does the clicking and copying. You get back a formatted spreadsheet.

That's a good example of what this is best suited for right now: repetitive, multi-step computer tasks that are tedious but not complicated. Things like:

• Pulling data from one application and entering it into another
• Generating routine reports from files on your desktop
• Organizing folders and renaming files across your system
• Filling out forms or updating records in software Claude can navigate

If you spend chunks of your week doing this kind of work, that's the use case to test first.

What You Need to Know Before You Try It

Anthropic is being unusually direct about the limitations, which is worth noting.

They say: the technology is still early, Claude can make mistakes, and you should not use it with sensitive data. Some apps are off-limits by default for security reasons. They specifically recommend starting with trusted applications and working with non-sensitive files until the feature matures.

That is honest guidance. Take it seriously. This is a research preview, not a polished product, and the security risks of giving any AI agent access to your full computer are not trivial. At minimum: close anything with sensitive data before you run it, and watch the first few tasks closely before you let Claude run independently.

The Bigger Picture

The competition behind this matters. Reuters reported this week that OpenAI is actively working to counter Anthropic's enterprise momentum, describing it as an "enterprise turf war." Both companies are racing to build AI that operates inside your existing tools rather than just answering questions beside them. Google is in the same race.

The practical implication for small businesses: the AI tools available to you are getting significantly more capable, and the pace of that improvement is accelerating. What Claude can do on your Mac in research preview today is likely a rough draft of what will be standard capability in productivity software by the end of the year.

The question isn't whether to pay attention to this shift. It's whether to test it now, while it's still rough and the learning curve is forgiving, or wait until everyone else has a head start.

Claude's computer use is available today inside Claude Cowork and Claude Code for paid subscribers. Mac only for now. Windows support has not been announced.

Sources: Anthropic blog, "Put Claude to work on your computer", March 24, 2026; VentureBeat; ZDNET hands-on; Claude Cowork documentation