Perplexity Computer

Perplexity Computer is an automated assistant from the search startup Perplexity that takes care of multi-step chores for you. Instead of a person clicking, searching, and typing through each step, you just give it a goal and it figures out the order of steps and handles them itself.

Think of it less as "type one question into a search box, get one answer" and more like handing a task to an errand runner and saying, "look into this and put it together for me." The runner visits multiple places if needed, double-checks things several times, and stitches together intermediate results into a final output. Because this back-and-forth adds up, the usage-based cost (token consumption) also rises along with it.

Perplexity was originally known as a search service that finds answers to questions, but the addition of this automated assistant feature is cited as a major driver behind the company's revenue growth.

News coverage notes that "the AI agent 'Perplexity Computer,' which handles automated tasks on a user's behalf, is reported to have driven this growth." Here, "agent" doesn't mean a simple one-question-one-answer chatbot, but a feature that carries out tasks through multiple self-directed steps to completion — see "agent" in related_slugs.

Instead of a simple one-shot question on Perplexity, try a request that requires multiple steps. For example, you could try a prompt like this:

"Find three day-trip destinations near Seoul for this weekend, and make a table comparing travel time and admission fees for each."

Since this kind of request requires several steps — searching, comparing, and organizing — it's a good way to compare how the result differs from a simple one-line Q&A.