AI Glossary
What is an AI agent?
AI agent: An AI agent is a model that doesn’t just answer — it takes actions: browsing the web, running code, calling tools and working toward a goal across multiple steps.
In plain English
A chatbot is a consultant: it tells you what to do. An agent is an intern: it goes and does it — looks things up, tries an approach, sees the error, fixes it, and reports back when done. The model decides its own next step instead of waiting for your next message.
Why it matters
- The current frontier: booking, researching, coding and filing done end-to-end
- Multiplies both usefulness and risk — an agent can act on a hallucination
- "Agentic" is why AI assistants increasingly ask for access to your tools
A concrete example
You ask for "the three best flights to Delhi under ₹8,000" — an agent searches airline sites, compares the results, and returns a table, performing a dozen steps you never see.
Related terms
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