Meta's Muse AI agent can now call U.S. businesses, but only for paying subscribers
Meta's consumer AI agent Muse can now place phone calls to U.S. businesses on users' behalf. The feature, first tested in September, is limited to paid subscribers.
Muse, the consumer AI agent built by technology company Meta, can now phone businesses in the United States on behalf of its users. The feature is available only to paying subscribers. It was first tested in September, when only a select group of early adopters who requested access could try it. Now anyone who pays for Muse can ask it to make calls.
Muse, which the company said last month has more than 10 million users, is trying to turn consumer AI into a mainstream product for everyday people. Phone calls would let the agent take on one more item from people's to-do lists.
What the calls are meant for
Alexandr Wang, Meta's chief AI officer and head of its Superintelligence Labs division, said the feature can handle calls people would rather not make, such as those to a cable company, the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), or a restaurant without online reservations. He announced the rollout on November 12.
Pricing and competitors
Muse subscriptions start at $20 per month, which includes 500 million Muse tokens per week. Heavier users can pay $100 per month for 3 billion tokens. A similar option is offered by the startup Instinct and by Google's Gemini.
However, the reception at the other end of the line can be mixed. Many businesses and receptionists hang up as soon as they realize they are speaking with an AI agent rather than a person. As AI gets better at mimicking a human voice, telling a customer apart from an AI acting on the customer's behalf will become harder.
Wang said this week that a recently added option to create a Muse email address will soon roll out to free users, while calls remain a paid-only feature for now.
