AI Watch: What are AI agents and what can they do for you?

An AI adoption report released by technology giant Microsoft in January 2026 showed that 16.3% of the world population uses Generative AI tools. Here, Kenya recorded AI use of 7.8%, which increased to 8.1% in the second half of 2025. Here, the average in global AI diffusion was 16.30%. 

Here, conversational AI models, including chatbots such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Deepseek, and Claude, among others, were most popular. Other conversational models, like virtual assistants and voicebots, are also widely used by AI adopters. 

While these generative AI remain widely used, AI agents are also being adopted in operations, workforces and task automation in different fields. On Citizen Digital’s AI Watch, we look into AI agents, what they are and their capabilities. 

What are AI agents 

AI agents refer to software systems or tools that use AI to perform tasks on behalf of users. These agents have capabilities to reason, plan, and have memory that enables them to process natural language like humans do. These systems have the autonomy to make decisions on behalf of humans through learning and adaptation. 

AI agents differ from chatbots, as the latter can assist with simple tasks while the former can perform complex tasks. Also, while chatbots have a limited learning capability and context awareness, AI agents have high learning capabilities and context awareness that support their autonomy. 

AI agents also differ from AI assistants, which are largely reactive, performing user requests when asked. This is different from agents, which are proactive, rather than reactive and have autonomy to perform tasks on their own. 

AI agents include Openclaw, OpenAI Operator, Gemini agent, Minami AI, Claude Cowork, among others. 

What AI agents can do for you? 

Autonomous AI agents can perform your daily tasks, such as planning, scheduling, and checking your calendar for actions such as setting up meetings and drafting emails. 

These tools can also help you manage your personal finances by drawing budgets based on your spending patterns, and also manage health through tracking data from wearable devices such as smart watches. 

Professionally, companies are using AI agents for workflow automations where they can handle repetitive administrative tasks and customer support services. Due to their autonomy, AI agents can also synthesise and comprehend information to come up with reports and analyses. 

While technical users can create agents with high reasoning and collaboration, beginners can use “no-code” methods to create agents for workflow automation using tools such as Microsoft’s Copilot and Lindi. 

When creating an agent, one needs to define their goals, provide context for reasoning and instruct the tools on how they should think and act. 

AI Agents and the future of work 

The future faces uncertainties as more organisations are moving from the experimental stage to synchronously adopting AI in their workforces.

A report by the World Economic Forum details that some occupations will have been distinct by 2030 as a result of AI-enabled ecosystems. 

The future for jobs report 2025 details how human-centric jobs are narrowing as specialized AI agents take over a number of tasks. Similarly, Deloitte predicts that half of the companies that use generative AI will have launched agentic AI pilots or proofs of concepts by 2027, unlocking a smart assistant that can perform tasks with minimal human supervision. 

“Automation has become significantly cheaper than mass upskilling and reskilling of workers,” the WEF report states.

The wide usage of AI agents is also a result of personnel shortage facing some organisations, who have resorted to automation with little human oversight. 

With these developments, technological skills are poised to become more important in jobs where AI and big data skills are expected to match analytical and creative thinking. 

Experts advocate for standards to promote transparency, monitoring and governance for agentic AI and improved trust through human-machine collaborations. 

However, the agentic AI age introduces safety and security concerns due to their ability to behave unpredictably as a result of their autonomy in reasoning and decision-making. Therefore, experts advise agentic AI adapters to prioritise investments in security technology.