Claude Dispatch: remote control for Claude Co-Work from your phone

Summary

Anthropic launched Dispatch, a feature that lets you control Claude Co-Work (desktop agent) from your phone. You pair your phone with your laptop and can send tasks remotely - Claude then works with your local files, folders, and apps (including Chrome) even when you’re away from your desk. It’s sandboxed with approval gates, currently on Max plans ($100/mo), rolling out to Pro ($20/mo) soon.

Key Insight

Dispatch bridges the gap between mobile and desktop AI agents. The key value proposition is that Claude Co-Work already has access to local files, folders, and desktop apps (including browser with authenticated sessions), and Dispatch simply gives you a remote trigger for that capability. This is Anthropic’s safer, more polished answer to OpenAI’s Operator - sandboxed execution with explicit user approval for folder access and internet use.

Practical constraints: your laptop must be on and the Claude app running (there’s a keep-awake feature). It’s a research preview, so expect instability. The pricing tier gate ($100/mo Max plan first, $20/mo Pro later) suggests Anthropic is using this to drive Max plan adoption.

The real power is in compound tasks that touch local files + web: “pull together a report from that spreadsheet on my desktop” or “take all my screenshots from today and put them into a mood board deck.” These are tasks that previously required you to be at your computer.