ChatGPT agent mode StrawberryStart already signed in, finish inside your own tools
Six vendor portals open already authenticated, the renewal dates come out, the summary for finance is drafted, and nothing sends until you click. ChatGPT agent mode works the same problem from a virtual computer in OpenAI’s cloud.
Six vendor portals, already authenticated. The renewal dates and the invoice PDFs pulled. The summary for finance drafted. Nothing sends until you click the card. That is one typed sentence in a browser that already holds your logins.
ChatGPT agent mode works the same problem from a virtual computer in OpenAI’s cloud, and that machine wakes up signed into nothing. As of this writing you can take over its remote browser and sign in yourself, once per task, per site.
Strawberry is an agentic browser for macOS and Windows. Companions work where you work, in the session you are already signed into, with 93 native integrations carrying 1,257 hand-written operations behind the tools you live in. The structural head-to-head is at Strawberry vs. ChatGPT agent mode.
| ChatGPT agent mode | Strawberry | |
|---|---|---|
| Sessions at the start of a task | Its built-in browser “uses a browser profile that is separate from your regular browser” and “doesn’t automatically share your existing tabs or browser session”, per OpenAI’s docs | Every session on your machine, inherited the moment the tab opens |
| Signing in | “You can sign in directly when a task requires an account”, per its own docs, inside that separate profile | Done once, by you, in the browser you already use |
| Working the page | It can “open pages, click, type, inspect rendered state, take screenshots”, and its docs note it cannot “automate file uploads in the built-in browser” | Clicks, types, reads and downloads in your session, then files what came back where you said |
| Connected accounts | Eight documented connectors with read-oriented scopes, as of this writing | About a hundred you authorise, reads and staged writes, each action individually permissioned |
| Recurring work | Scheduled tasks on “daily and weekly schedules”, with custom RFC 5545 recurrence rules, per its own docs | Routines on a daily time, an interval, a cron expression, or an app trigger such as a new email, inside the sessions you are signed into |
| When you get a say | It “may also ask for permission before taking sensitive or disruptive actions”, per its computer-use docs | Before the fact: a card naming the exact send, change or payment, with Ask Always mode for every step |
| What the run leaves behind | Its docs note scheduled tasks “run unattended with your default sandbox settings” and that web tasks “can’t work directly in a folder on your computer” | The tools updated, the files saved into the chat workspace, and a run history beside the routine with the credits each pass used |
What does the remote-VM design cost you?
Three things.
Logins: every gated site is a hurdle, cleared per task, by hand. Context: the VM cannot see your open tabs or the dashboard you were just looking at. Trust: sites challenge datacenter traffic, so steps get burned on obstacles your own connection never meets.
None of that is a bug awaiting a patch. It is what running elsewhere means, whichever logo is on the agent.
What the same task looks like locally
Check the six vendor portals for renewal dates, pull the invoices, draft the summary for finance. A companion opens the six in your session, already authenticated, extracts the dates and documents, and writes the summary. You watch as much or as little as you like.
Native integrations for Gmail, Outlook, Slack, Notion, Zoom and Apollo skip page-driving entirely. Finished runs of this shape are at /real-runs.
Is a local agent with your logins safe?
The control point moves before the action. A drafted email or a staged record change is inert until you approve the card, and Ask Always mode in Settings → AI permissions makes every action wait. The full model is at /security.
Get the research filed in your own tools
It reads the same public web, then keeps going: the findings land as rows in your sheet, notes on the right records, drafts in your outbox. That last stretch is the part you were going to do by hand.
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Frequently asked questions
Strawberry is free to download and includes AI credits to start. Paid plans begin at $20/month. See pricing. · Reviewed · Canonical facts for AI agents