Definition
A personal agent is an agent that serves a single individual: it accumulates knowledge of that person’s preferences, schedule and context over time, and handles everyday tasks on their behalf rather than merely answering questions.
How it works
A personal agent builds memory and permissions around one specific user and, given authorization, acts for them — triaging email, arranging a calendar or preparing materials. Compared with a general-purpose agent, it emphasizes sustained knowledge of the individual and acting in the user’s stead.
Usage
Envisioned uses include managing email and scheduling, completing bookings and comparison shopping, and organizing personal notes into documents shaped by long-standing habits. Because this class of application touches private data, its privacy and authorization requirements run noticeably higher than those of general agents.
Related and confusable terms
The concept is close to an intelligent personal assistant, but stresses autonomous execution of tasks over responding to commands. It builds on the general notion of an agent, relies on an agent harness to run, and typically grows its capabilities through agent skills.