One AI employee. Which do you hire?
Grok Bot, $30: a team that makes calls
Claude Duet, $20: the careful one. You can't get in
ChatGPT dots, $100: won the only independent test
I compared all three, the WIRED test and 25+ posts from daily users ↓ https://x.com/i/article/2117984879396655104
$20, $30 or $100: Which AI Employee to Hire — Grok Bot vs Claude Duet vs ChatGPT dots
On October 29, OpenAI's head of product doubled the limits on every ChatGPT Pro plan
Three days later, a Grok Bot user hit 100% of the weekly limit with four days left before the reset
Elon Musk answered in one line
And Anthropic is still letting people into Claude Duet one waitlist wave at a time
Same week. Three companies. Three very different bets on what an AI employee should cost you
Meanwhile your timeline is full of people telling you which one won. Most of them run one agent. Some run none
I don't run all three either. Almost nobody does: dots starts at $100 a month, and Duet is a US-only waitlist
So I did the next best thing. I read the official docs and launch pages for all three, the independent WIRED test that ran them on the same tasks, and 25+ posts from people who use them every day
Here is what $20, $30 and $100 a month actually buy you
What you get
- The 30-second answer: which one to hire for your situation
- One table with everything that matters: price, limits, computer, channels, approvals
- Six rounds, head to head, with receipts
- The one independent test that ran all three on the same five tasks
- The viral posts that lied, and how to spot the next one
- Step 0: one message that sets up any of the three
- 9 copy-paste jobs, three per agent, plus a limit saver for each
- A one-card cheat sheet. Every paste block is also in one PDF in my Telegram
The 30-second answer
- You live on X, want a team of bots and the cheapest real way in: Grok Bot, $30 a month. Watch the weekly limit
- You already pay for Claude, you're in the US and you want the careful one with the best app: Claude Duet, $20 a month. If you can get off the waitlist
- Your work lives in Slack and texts, and you want the one that won the independent test: ChatGPT dots, $100 a month
The rest of this article is why
Everything on one table
Every row comes from the companies' own docs and launch posts, checked November 4. Links are at the end
Screenshot this table. Now the six rounds
Round 1: What your money actually buys
The sticker price is the least important number here. The limit behind it is the one that bites
Grok Bot. $30 a month gets you the Premium tier of the X Subscription. Super is $100 and Ultra is $200, with much higher usage. Since October 12, Grok Bot shares one weekly pool with Grok chat, Imagine, Voice and Cursor. SpaceXSI does not publish how big that pool is. Go over it and you pay on demand
And there is no cheap way to test it
The limit pain is not new either. Back in August, one user hit 86% of the weekly limit in a day and a half, on the $200 plan
Claude Duet. No extra price. It comes with Claude Pro ($20) and Max ($100 or $200). But it draws from the same 5-hour and weekly limits as your chats, and its background work counts too: the morning brief, the check-ins. That is why it only checks your apps every few hours. People who get off the waitlist get one full limit reset, usable until November 30
ChatGPT dots. Your first dot comes with ChatGPT Pro 100 ($100) or Business Premium (two seats minimum). Free, Go and Plus users can't make one. Chatting with your dot is kept separate from your normal ChatGPT usage, and OpenAI says it will keep the extended dot limits "for now"
Why is everyone rationing? Anthropic says an agent costs 4 to 15 times as much as a simple chat. Every company is learning that at the same time
Verdict: Duet has the lowest price but you may not get in. Grok Bot is the cheapest one you can buy today. dots is the most generous right now, if $100 doesn't hurt. Watch the words "for now"
Round 2: One employee or a whole team
Grok Bot is built around a team. You make several Bots, each with one job, and at work you can share Team Bots with everyone. SpaceXSI's own Data Bot does data science for the whole company
Their number: about 70 hours of data scientists' work in one week
Claude Duet is one employee in one thread. You talk, and it turns what you said into a task list and works through it. It answers to one person, so there is no shared queue for a team
ChatGPT dots starts with one dot that you name. OpenAI says teams of dots are coming. Companies can already test "specialist dots" with their own logins for one defined job
Verdict: if you want a team today, it's Grok Bot. If you want one assistant that just handles your day, Duet or dots
Round 3: Its own computer
All three work on a computer in the cloud, so your laptop can be closed. The details are where they split
Grok Bot. One cloud computer for all your Bots. Logins, browser sessions and files are shared across every Bot you make. The docs say it plainly: "Do not use separate Bots as a security boundary." Deleting a Bot doesn't remove its files or sessions. When a site needs a passkey or a captcha, you take over the computer and finish that step
Claude Duet. Its own virtual machine with its own browser. You can't watch or take over that browser yet. It can't reach files on your computer
ChatGPT dots. Its own cloud computer, and you can hit "Take over" at any moment. You can also let it work on your laptop: off by default, one machine at a time, with the ChatGPT app open
Verdict: dots gives you the most control. Grok Bot gives you the least separation: treat all your Bots as one employee with one keyring
Round 4: Where you talk to it
Grok Bot. Desktop and phone apps, typing or voice. It is the only one that lives inside X: tag @bot under any post and it hands the task to your Grok Bot. It can also make phone calls for you
Claude Duet. One thread in its own app or on claude.ai, by text or voice. It sends a morning brief, then messages you only when something needs you
ChatGPT dots. Inside ChatGPT on every device, in Slack, by voice call, and since October 28, by text message]
Verdict: dots meets you in the most places. Grok Bot is the one for people who live on X. Duet is one quiet thread
Round 5: Who asks before it acts
This is the round I care about most. An agent that can pay, send and sign is only as good as the moment it stops and asks you
Grok Bot. Auto Review is on by default. It is a model that looks at each action and either runs it or asks you first. You can add up to 20 "Allow" rules and 20 "Ask first" rules. Emails written by routines wait as drafts until you press Send
Two lines from the docs worth reading twice:
- Auto Review "should complement, not replace, least privilege and explicit approval boundaries"
- Saved cards fill in at checkout without a separate approval. Leave "Securely save to Bot's vault" unchecked if you want to approve every payment
The flip side of asking: Peter Yang wants his Grok Bot to answer emails for him, but it needs his approval for every reply
Claude Duet. It reads, drafts and prepares on its own. Before it sends a message, pays, signs a document or deletes anything, it shows you the exact action and waits. Trading securities and moving money between accounts are off-limits even with your approval. Purchases go through a one-time virtual card, so your real card number is never shared
ChatGPT dots. Its auto-review decides for each risky step: go ahead, ask you, or hand it to you. Your own rules pick one of four: act without asking, act only when told, ask first, or hand off. Changing a password always stays with you. One catch: pausing a dot stops its main task, but not delegated or scheduled runs
Verdict: Duet is the strictest. dots is the most configurable. Grok Bot gives the most power and needs the most homework
If you want to know why that last click matters, my first article is about an agent that turned off its own alarm ↓
Round 6: The only independent test
WIRED ran six agents for one day on an iPhone: the same five tasks, each scored from 1 to 5. Here are our three
- dots, 20 points. It placed the lunch order itself, caught the calendar conflict and offered another time
- Grok Bot, 16. Missed the calendar conflict. Gave the best answer in a late-night chat about insomnia, when it offered to set a reminder
- Claude Duet, 16. Flagged the conflict hours early but offered no alternative. Won "Best Interface"
WIRED's verdict on dots: "Dots performed the best overall in these tests and failed at a task that's fairly specific to my niche"
Two caveats. It was one day, one person, no coding. And even about the winner, WIRED told most people to wait for a cheaper tier
Peter Yang has used all of them. His take:
Useful so far? Follow me @molodoykiskaeb. I read the docs so you don't have to
What people actually got done
Tables tell you what each one can do. Stories tell you what each one is for. Here are the best ones I found, from real users and from the teams themselves
Grok Bot: it picks up the phone. A dad told his Grok Bot his daughter hurt her foot at dance practice. It found a pediatric orthopedist nearby, called when they opened and got her in at 9:30 the same day. He was driving the whole time
Another user had it shop for car insurance, then call Progressive about glass coverage while he picked up his kids
ChatGPT dots: it works across people. OpenAI's head of product has a work dot called Burger and a personal dot called Dorito. They emailed each other for his documents, then worked with his accountant to file taxes. 20 minutes
A user in Japan asked their dot to find a spare part for a keyboard. It contacted the maker's US headquarters, found the part in stock, and the package just arrived from China. 2.5 million people watched that one
Claude Duet: it notices things. These three come from Anthropic's own launch page, so read them as the best case:
- A real estate broker: it caught a showing on her calendar set for the wrong day. "Exactly the kind of thing I want caught without having to ask"
- A restaurant owner with about 110 employees uses it for accounting, support, marketing and invoices: "I don't need to open up 100 tabs"
- A brand strategist: it noticed a client call right before her flight and offered to move it
See the pattern? Grok Bot runs errands. dots executes across systems and people. Duet watches and warns
The teams know they're rivals, and they're having fun with it
The viral posts that lied
Every new agent gets a wave of posts promising money while you sleep. Two of the biggest got Community Notes
"My Grok Bot turned $69.67 into $13,370 by morning." 459,000 views. The note: the video shows a simulated paper-trading dashboard
"Introducing Claude Duet for Video Editing." 627,000 views. The note: it's a third-party integration presented as a Duet feature. That company is not Anthropic
Three checks before you believe the next one:
1. Money moving on its own? Duet won't trade or move money between accounts even if you approve it. Grok Bot and dots run a review before risky steps. "It made $X while I slept" needs proof, not a dashboard
1. Is the feature on the company's own page? If it only exists on a startup's account, it's an integration, not the agent
1. One screenshot, no settings, no repeat? Read the replies before you read the hype
Step 0: one message that sets up any of the three
Whichever one you hire, its first message decides how it behaves. Fill in the brackets and paste:
Where it goes in each one:
- Grok Bot: make a new Bot and send this as its first message. The docs say to give each Bot one primary job there
- Claude Duet: it already has your Claude memory and connected apps. Paste it, then tell it what you want to hear about and how often
- ChatGPT dots: paste it, then turn the "ask first" line into a custom rule, so it holds even when you forget to say it
Three jobs for Grok Bot
Play to its strengths: a team of bots, X, the phone
1. The X research desk. Peter Yang called its X access "amazing for research"
2. The phone call you keep postponing
3. The deal tracker, for the new shopping feature
Limit saver:
Three jobs for Claude Duet
Play to its strengths: it notices, it asks, it drafts
1. A morning brief that only says what matters
2. The invoice chaser, straight from Anthropic's own examples
3. Meeting prep that fixes its weak spot. In the WIRED test it caught the conflict but offered no fix. So ask for one
Limit saver:
Three jobs for ChatGPT dots
Play to its strengths: Slack, texts, getting things done across tools
1. The feedback tracker, the same job an OpenAI engineer gives her own dot
2. Text it your paperwork
3. A document that never goes stale, one of OpenAI's own examples
Limit saver, plus a fix for the pause catch from Round 5
Pick in 10 seconds
Your first week
1. Day 1. Pick one with the card. Paste Step 0. 10 minutes
1. Day 2. Give it one job from its list. Run it once while you watch, and note every time it asks you something
1. Day 3. Tune it: what to stay quiet about, how often to check
1. Day 4. Paste the limit saver. Look at how much of your limit is already gone
1. Day 5. Add the second job
1. Day 7. Look back at the week: what you approved, what you rejected, what it missed. Not worth the price? Cancel before the month renews
The short version
Grok Bot is the team you can actually buy today. The weekly limit is the risk
Claude Duet is the most careful one, with the best app. The waitlist is the risk
ChatGPT dots won the only independent test. The $100 price is the risk
Whichever you hire: one job per agent, ask before it sends or pays, quiet by default
The timeline is still arguing about it
If you read this far
→ Bookmark this for the day you're ready to pay for one
→ Follow @molodoykiskaeb
→ The table, Step 0 and all 13 paste blocks in one PDF: t.me/mxlxdxykiskxeb
→ Tell me in the replies which one you'd hire, and why
Sources
Checked November 4, 2026
- Grok Bot docs: Get started
- Grok Bot docs: Approvals, security and privacy
- The X Subscription plans, Teslarati
- Musk on Grok Bot costs, Forbes
- Grok Bot quota cuts and agent costs, The Decoder
- Introducing Claude Duet, Anthropic
- Claude Duet launch, The Decoder
- OpenAI launches dots, SiliconANGLE
- dots plans, channels and limits, Fello AI
- WIRED: I Tested Every Major AI Agent for a Day (republished)