A year ago, a personal AI agent you could text was a demo. By October 2026, TechCrunch counted more than twenty of them, from funded startups to open-source projects. They share an idea: instead of opening an app, you text an assistant the way you would text a person, and it gets things done.
This guide covers the ones people ask us about most, what each says it does on its own site, and how to choose. We build one of them, LVLZ, so we have kept every claim about the others to what their sites and the press say, with links. Details were checked on October 17, 2026.
The short answer
- Instinct if you want an agent that also places phone calls and you have an early-access invite.
- Poke if you want a free plan and use WhatsApp or Telegram.
- Martin if you want to reach your assistant by voice, email or Slack, focused on calendar and inbox.
- OpenInstinct if you are a developer who wants to self-host.
- LVLZ if you want the agent to run errands on websites and keep every task, table and file in a workspace you can open, with open sign-up and published pricing.
Instinct
Instinct describes itself as a personal assistant that understands what you are working on. You text or call it, and it uses a phone and computer the way you would: buying groceries, booking a train, sending flowers. It also offers a human concierge for high-touch tasks and a Trusted Person Network that lets agents of people you trust coordinate. Instinct raised $1 billion at a $10 billion valuation in September 2026, according to VKTR, and is in early access with no published pricing.
Full comparison: LVLZ vs Instinct.
Poke
Poke is a proactive assistant in Apple Messages, WhatsApp and Telegram. It connects to apps such as Notion, Gmail, Google Calendar, GitHub, Linear and Todoist, and uses shareable "recipes" for automations. It has a free plan, Pro at $19 a month and Ultra at $199 a month.
Full comparison: LVLZ vs Poke.
Martin
Martin is an AI personal assistant you reach by text, phone call, email, Slack or its iOS app. It focuses on your calendar, inbox, reminders and to-dos. TechCrunch lists subscriptions from $21 a month.
Full comparison: LVLZ vs Martin.
OpenInstinct
OpenInstinct is an open-source, MIT-licensed iMessage assistant that can use a browser. You deploy it to your own Vercel account, which must be on the Pro plan, and connect services for messaging, the browser and the database. It suits developers who want to read and change every line.
Full comparison: LVLZ vs OpenInstinct.
Others worth knowing
TechCrunch’s list also includes family assistants such as Ollie, Ohai and Fambot, a travel assistant called Miso, Tomo for goals and accountability, and work-focused agents such as Town. If your need is narrow, a specialist may fit better than a general agent.
LVLZ
LVLZ is a personal AI agent you text on iMessage, on one shared number. You name it, and it runs errands in a cloud browser, handles Gmail and Google Calendar, keeps tasks and projects, creates your own tables from a casual text, writes Excel, Word and PowerPoint files, and remembers what matters to you. Payments, messages to new people and deletions wait for your approval, and that rule lives outside the model. Everything it does appears in your workspace at app.lvlz.ai. Plans are $19, $49 and $149 a month, each with a 7-day free trial. WhatsApp on the same number is being built.
How to choose
- Where will you text it? iMessage, WhatsApp, Telegram, SMS or a phone call. Pick the agent that lives where you already are.
- Can you see what it did? A chat thread is a poor record. Look for a place that lists every task and action.
- Who approves the risky steps? Payments and messages to new people should wait for your yes, enforced by the system rather than the model’s judgment. We explain why in Why approvals belong outside the model.
- Can you start today? Some agents are invite-only. Check for open sign-up and published pricing.
- Will it grow with you? If you run a business, look for shared workspaces, custom tables and documents in your brand.
See every comparison on one page at lvlz.ai/compare.