AI assistants have officially taken over the Silicon Valley zeitgeist. Here are the 4 worth knowing, ranked by buzz-worthiness:

Instinct: Handles life admin over text, from booking appointments and making reservations to running errands. Just raised $1 billion. Free for now; invite-only.

Meta Muse: Personal-focused. Helps with shopping, planning, and everyday tasks. Free with limits. (I haven’t used this one because…Meta + data… here’s my Tea).

OpenAI Dots: OpenAI’s work + personal assistant. Starts at $100/month. (This is the one I’m using right now and I love it.)

Gemini Spark: Taps into Google's ecosystem, including Gmail, Drive, and Calendar, to manage tasks across your digital life. Available for $19.99/month; higher limits from $99.99/month.

My Tea on assistants: AI companies are racing to own the interface layer—the final touchpoint between you and the technology.

That’s because models are quickly commoditizing, while AI is becoming increasingly headless: the interface you use no longer needs to be tied to a single model. An assistant can simply choose the best model for each task behind the scenes.

Labs are quickly realizing that their models could become interchangeable engines. The assistant then becomes the interface, the decision-maker and the relationship that you, the consumer, actually trust.

Having the best model once meant you were winning AI. That’s no longer the case.

Now, it’ll be about owning the best interface that sits on top of it.

Something to brew on ☕️