Meta launched Muse on September 8, 2026. It is a personal AI agent with its own app, separate from the Meta AI assistant that lives inside Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook. Meta says Muse can "open a browser, fill out forms, and negotiate" on a user's behalf, and it runs each user's agent in a dedicated virtual machine. Two weeks later at Connect, Meta added retail and payment partners, Mac control, and an email address for the agent. For brands, the important detail is the business model: Muse carries no ads, and Mark Zuckerberg said Meta expects to profit by taking a small fee from transactions.
Muse at a Glance
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Launched | September 8, 2026 |
| Region and age | United States at launch, adults 18 and over |
| Where it runs | Muse app on iOS and Android, muse.ai on the web, a WhatsApp chat, and a Mac app from September 17 |
| Architecture | A dedicated secure virtual machine per user, with a visible browser so the user can watch the agent work |
| Model | Meta's Muse model family, built at Meta Superintelligence Labs. Meta's Connect material does not name the exact model |
| Approval | Explicit approval is required before the agent spends money or sends a message |
| Business model | No advertising. Meta expects to take a small fee from transactions |
| Early uptake | More than 2.5 million US downloads, according to Sensor Tower data cited by the Los Angeles Times. Meta has not published its own figures |
Pricing
Launch coverage reports three tiers, metered by weekly tokens. Meta has not published this table in the Connect material we reviewed, so treat it as reported pricing.
| Tier | Price | Reported weekly allowance |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | 100 million tokens |
| Power | $20 per month | 500 million tokens |
| Maximum | $100 per month | 3 billion tokens |
The free tier is the strategic difference from OpenAI. Dots start on plans at $100 per month. Muse is available to anyone in the US with the app, which gives it a far larger potential user base for shopping tasks. See OpenAI Dots vs Meta Muse.
What Changed at Connect
On September 23, Meta expanded what Muse can reach:
- Retail and payment connectors. Walmart, Best Buy, Sephora, Ulta, Gap, Wayfair, and others, plus the entire Shopify catalogue, with Shop Pay and PayPal for payment. The full list is in the Muse connector tracker.
- Mac control. Meta says Muse "can now drive any app on your Mac."
- An email address. Muse gets its own address that it can use to get things done, which means brands will start receiving email written and sent by an agent.
- Voice and avatar. Muse Realtime Voice supports long conversations while tasks run in the background, and Muse Realtime Avatar gives the agent an interactive face.
- Glasses. Muse comes to Meta's AI glasses in the coming months, activated by saying the agent's name, and can act on what the wearer is looking at.
Where Muse Has Been Blocked
Amazon began blocking Muse from its retail site on the night of September 20. Amazon said Meta did not tell it that Muse would access the store and that the agent does not identify itself. Meta says Muse never sees passwords or payment methods and pays with single-use cards. The dispute is covered in Amazon blocks Meta Muse, and it matters to every retailer deciding whether to welcome or refuse agent traffic.
Brand Visibility Implications
- Meta earns when Muse transacts, so Muse will steer toward places it can transact. A connected retailer is a completed purchase and a fee. An unconnected one is a browser session that may fail. Expect connected partners to be favoured in practice even without any paid placement.
- Shopify merchants are in by default. The whole Shopify catalogue is reachable, so a small Shopify store is available to Muse on day one while a large retailer on a custom stack may not be.
- Product data decides the shortlist. An agent choosing between items reads price, stock, shipping, and returns. Missing or stale fields remove a product from consideration. See agent-readable product pages.
- Muse is not Meta AI. The assistant inside Meta's apps answers questions and cites sources. Muse acts. Track them separately. See Meta AI citation patterns and Meta AI usage statistics.
- Email and phone channels will see agents. With its own email address, Muse can contact support, ask for quotes, and chase orders. Teams should decide how they want to handle agent-originated messages.
Methodology
This page is built from vendor announcements and launch-week reporting, not from Presenc AI measurements. Primary sources are used wherever one exists, including Meta's Connect 2026 newsroom post and product blog, xAI's news page, and X's Original Content Rewards help page. Where a detail comes only from press coverage, such as TechCrunch on Dots, Bloomberg on Amazon and Muse, or PPC Land on X Ads MCP, the page says so. These products are new and none of the vendors has published independent success rates. Status as of October 1, 2026.
How Presenc AI Helps
Presenc AI tracks how Meta AI and other assistants describe and recommend your brand, and its crawl analytics show which agents reach your site. Use both to see whether you are in the set an agent like Muse can choose from.