Muse vs Dots vs Grok Bot: The 3 AI Agents Compared (2026)

Muse, ChatGPT dots and Grok Bot are the three always-on AI agents launched by Meta, OpenAI and xAI in August and September 2026. All three have their own cloud computer and keep working while you are away. Muse is the free personal agent (US and Canada only). Grok Bot is the developer's agent, bundled with plans from $20 a month. Dots are the business agent, from $100 a month, with 4,000+ app connections and Slack and Teams access. For most individuals, start with Muse; for coders, Grok Bot; for teams, dots.

Disclosure: we have no affiliate relationship with Meta, OpenAI, xAI or Cursor. Our Muse guide uses our own referral code, which gives us bonus Muse tokens (not cash) when redeemed. See our affiliate disclosure.

Key takeaways

• Launch order: Grok Bot on 11 August, Muse on 8 September, dots on 29 September 2026.
• Cheapest access: Muse is free (100M tokens a week). Grok Bot from $20 a month. Dots from $100 a month.
• Models: Muse runs Muse Spark, dots run GPT-6 Astra, and Grok Bot does not disclose its model.
• Regions: Muse is US and Canada only. Dots on Pro exclude the UK, EEA and Switzerland. Grok Bot publishes no country list.
• None of them is safe to run unsupervised. All three vendors warn that their agent makes mistakes, and all three hand passwords and payments back to you.

Muse vs dots vs Grok Bot: full comparison table

Verified against each vendor's own pages on 1 October 2026.

How much does each AI agent cost?

The price spread is wide: from nothing to $500 a month.

Muse is the only one with a real free tier. Mark Zuckerberg announced it is "free to use for up to 100M tokens per week." Meta's paid plans are Power ($20 a month, 500M tokens a week) and Maximum ($100 a month, 3B tokens a week). Redeeming a referral code within 48 hours of joining adds 1 billion bonus tokens; our guide to getting 1 billion Muse tokens shows how.

Grok Bot is "included with all SuperGrok, Cursor Pro, and Cursor Teams plans" since 26 August. Cursor Pro costs $20 a month and SuperGrok $30. Its usage is separate from your plan's and resets weekly, with a free trial credit for new users.

Dots come only with ChatGPT Pro ($100, $200 or $500 a month) or Business Premium ($100 per user a month annually, two-seat minimum). "Your first dot is included" at no extra cost.

What can each agent actually do?

All three share a core idea: an agent with its own computer that keeps working after you close the app. They differ in what they are best at.

Muse is built for personal life. Meta says it "can open a browser, fill out forms, and negotiate on their behalf," and buys with one-time cards from Link by Stripe. Meta announced Walmart, Best Buy, Expedia and Instacart connectors at Connect.

Dots are built for professional work. They connect to "over 4,000 apps" through OpenAI's plugins, can start Codex tasks, and "work towards your goals 24/7."

Grok Bot is built for technical and repetitive work. It has "a browser, filesystem, and terminal," works on sites "with no clean API or MCP," and can learn a job by watching you do it once (recordings of up to ten minutes), then repeat it on a schedule as a routine.

In short: Muse runs errands, dots run business software, and Grok Bot runs workflows.

Which agent has the best permission controls?

Dots, narrowly. All three keep the riskiest actions in human hands, but OpenAI's system is the most configurable.

Dots let you set each type of action to one of four modes: "Take action without asking / Take action if pre-approved / Ask before taking action / Hand off to you." Password changes and money transfers always require you to take over, and "Custom rules cannot turn off core safety requirements."

Grok Bot offers "Allow once," "Always allow" and "Deny" for each request, plus a model-based Auto Review with "Ask first" and "Allow automatically" rules. Passwords, two-factor codes, CAPTCHAs and payments go to a manual takeover.

Muse asks before it sends an email or makes a purchase, and a separate agent Meta calls Sentinel must approve outbound actions. It offers fewer user-facing options than the other two.

None of these systems is a guarantee. xAI's docs note that "An approval controls the proposed action. It does not reverse work already completed."

Which agent is the most private?

None is private in the way a local tool is. All three run in the vendor's cloud and keep logs. The differences are in the details.

Muse: Meta says it "doesn't share a person's conversations or the data in their VM with Meta's ad systems." But Meta trains on your content by default (opt out under Settings > Data Controls), and its terms say Meta "may access and retain logs of actions taken by Muse." An encrypted Confidential VM is promised "later this year." Muse also faces two disputed incidents, involving a Marketplace sale and a reporter's Mac Messages.

Dots: "You currently cannot view, delete or directly modify individual dot memories." Disconnecting an app does not remove what the dot already learned, and human review can happen even with model improvement switched off.

Grok Bot: each user gets an isolated microVM, but every Bot you run shares it. "Do not use separate Bots as a security boundary." Its computers run "In the United States today."

If privacy is the deciding factor, read our guide to running AI free on your own computer with Ollama.

Which agent can you use in the UK, Canada or Europe?

In Canada, all three are options. Muse arrived on 18 September, dots on Pro are available, and Grok Bot has no published restriction.

In the UK, the picture splits:

• Muse is not officially available. People sign up through a US VPN connection, and in our testing Muse keeps working after the VPN is switched off. Meta's terms do not mention VPNs, but Meta "may suspend or terminate your access to Muse ... at any time, for any reason." See the steps and risks in our Muse token guide.
• Dots exclude Pro users, but are "available to Business Premium users across all supported ChatGPT regions." That means at least two seats, or $200 a month on annual billing.
• Grok Bot has no published country restriction, so it is the simplest official route.

In the EU, the same applies as in the UK, with the addition of Switzerland to the dots Pro exclusion. Sam Altman told NBC the EU process "takes longer, and sometimes unpredictably longer."

How reliable are they right now?

All three are weeks or a few months old, and the evidence says to supervise them closely.

Muse: Meta's help page warns it "may be inaccurate or take unexpected actions." In a Tom's Guide shopping test, only 3 of 7 prompts worked.

Dots: OpenAI says "Dots can still make mistakes, so always review consequential work." Its own system card reports unwanted persistence in 17.4% of GPT-6 Astra test runs at maximum reasoning budget, and NBC reported two keynote demos failing on stage at launch.

Grok Bot: still labelled beta. xAI's docs warn that "A site may still block automation, require a new login, present a CAPTCHA, or require human confirmation," that "Some services flag datacenter IP addresses," and that a computer reset "can lose recent or unsynced work."

The practical rule is the same for all three: start with read-only or low-stakes jobs and widen permissions only after the agent has handled them well.

Which should you choose?

Choose Muse if you want a personal agent for errands, shopping and bookings; you are in the US or Canada; you want to pay nothing; or you like messaging an agent through WhatsApp.

Choose Grok Bot if you are a developer, you already pay for Cursor or SuperGrok, you need to automate the same web task every week, or you want official access in the UK for $20 to $30 a month.

Choose ChatGPT dots if you run a business team on Slack or Teams, you need many business apps connected, or you already pay for ChatGPT Pro.

Combine them if your needs split: Muse for personal life costs nothing, so pairing it with Grok Bot or dots for work is reasonable.

For head-to-heads, see Muse vs ChatGPT Dots, ChatGPT Dots vs Grok Bot and Muse vs Grok Bot.

The verdict

There is no single winner, because these three are not really competing for the same person. Muse is the best agent for most individuals, simply because it is free and built for daily life. Grok Bot is the best value for technical users, with a terminal and teach-by-watching from $20 a month. Dots are the most complete product for businesses, with the widest app reach and the clearest permission system, at a premium price.

The honest caveat applies to all three: these are first versions with real, documented failure modes. Use them as capable assistants you check, not employees you trust blindly.

Related reading: ChatGPT dots explained and best AI productivity tools.

Every price, region and quote verified against Meta's, OpenAI's, xAI's and Cursor's own pages on 1 October 2026. All three products change frequently, so check before subscribing.