Amazon unveils AI that can take control of your web browser

Nova Act is first AI model to come out of Amazon’s new artificial general intelligence lab

Amazon launched its Nova Act AI model on 31 March, 2025 (Amazon)

Amazon has unveiled a new artificial intelligence model that can take control of a user’s web browser and perform actions on their behalf.

The general-purpose AI agent, called Nova Act, is part of a new generation of of artificial intelligence that gives AI chatbots the ability to act semi-autonomously in order to serve as a digital assistant.

“We think of agents as systems that can complete tasks and act in a range of digital and physical environments on behalf of the user,” an Amazon blog post stated.

“Today, such agents are still in an early stage. The Nova Act SDK is a crucial step forward, toward building reliable agents by enabling developers to break down complex workflows into atomic commands (e.g., search, checkout, answer questions about the screen).”

Amazon Nova Act is the first AI model to come out of the tech giant’s new AGI SF Lab, which is dedicated to developing artificial general intelligence, or human-level intelligence.

Led by former OpenAI researchers, the lab claims that Nova Act is able to outperform rival AI agents developed by Anthropic and OpenAI.

It is currently only available for developers, who will use it to build real-world applications, such as making online reservations at a restaurant or ordering food.

Once ready, these tools could then potentially be rolled out via its Alexa voice assistant to offer the functionality to its millions of users.

Earlier this month, researchers in China unveiled an advanced AI agent called Manus that is capable of carrying out a vast range of tasks independently, from buying property to developing video games.

Yichao Ji, co-founder and chief scientist of Manus AI, described it as “the next evolution of AI” and “the next paradigm of human-machine collaboration”.

Victor Mustar, head of product at AI platform Hugging Face, said it was “mind-blowing” in its capabilities.

“Got access and it’s true... Manus is the most impressive AI tool I’ve ever tried,” he wrote on X. “The user experience is what so many others promised... but this time it just works.”