AI Coworker vs AI Agent — What's the Difference and Which Should You Use?

After releasing a bunch of posts lately on AI, I’ve had one question more than any others. What is the difference between an AI Agent (something like Viktor), and a co-pilot or co-worker (like Claude Cowork). In the video above and this post I dig into that topic in detail.

What Is Cowork?

Cowork is Claude’s computer-use tool. It controls your browser and works alongside you on your actual computer. You train it using skill files — long documents that tell it how to do specific tasks — and then it follows those rules to get work done.

I use it primarily for bookkeeping and order processing at East Coast Roast, my coffee roasting business. Every day I have MYOB reconciliations, supplier invoices, wholesale orders from email and Ordermentum, and a bunch of repetitive admin. I’ve trained Cowork (I call her Rosie) to handle about 70-80% of that work.

I wrote a full article on this — How to Replace Your Bookkeeper with AI — if you want the deep dive.

What Is Viktor?

Viktor is an autonomous AI agent that lives in Slack. It connects to tools like WordPress, Mailchimp, Google Drive, and more. You give it a task, it goes away and does it, and comes back when it’s done.

I use Viktor for marketing across all my businesses. Blog posts, email campaigns, SEO, image generation, Instagram content, site fixes — the lot. I covered everything Viktor has done for me in this post.

The Key Differences

After using both daily for a few months, here’s how I’d break it down.

“Work With” vs “Work For”

This is the biggest difference and it’s right there in the names.

Cowork is a coworker. You work alongside it. You’re both sitting there doing the job together. I’ll be on my Windows machine doing orders while Rosie is on my Mac doing reconciliations. If she gets stuck, she asks me. If I see her doing something wrong, I jump in. It’s collaborative.

Viktor is more like delegating to someone. You give him the task, he goes away, and he comes back with the finished product. You don’t see what he’s doing while he’s doing it. He’s autonomous — he figures out the approach, writes scripts, connects to your tools, and delivers the result. You just review it.

For something like accounting, I actually prefer the coworker approach. I’m a bit nervous about fully autonomous AI messing around in my MYOB. I want to see what it’s thinking. I want to check the categories. I want to know it’s putting fuel to fuel and not to motor vehicle registration (MYOB’s built-in auto-categorisation gets this wrong all the time, by the way).

For marketing, I prefer the autonomous approach. I don’t need to watch Viktor write a blog post in real-time. I just need it to be good when it’s done. And it usually is.

Speed

Viktor is significantly faster. It goes away, does its thing in the background, and comes back in minutes. He’ll write a full blog post, generate images, upload it to WordPress, set up a Mailchimp campaign, and create Instagram graphics — all in about 10 minutes.

Cowork is slower than me at the actual tasks. A reconciliation that takes me 30 seconds might take Cowork five minutes. It’s clicking through browser elements, reading the screen, thinking about what to do next, clicking again. It’s not fast.

But here’s the thing — speed matters differently for each tool. Cowork runs on a fixed monthly fee. Unless the task is time-critical (like getting orders done before the van leaves at 1pm), it doesn’t really matter if it takes an hour. I’ll have it running in the background while I’m watching MAFS after work and it’ll text me when it’s done.

Viktor uses tokens, so speed actually affects cost less, but you get the result much quicker because it’s working server-side, not clicking through a browser on your laptop.

Memory

This is a game changer and it’s hard to appreciate until you see it in action.

Viktor has built-in memory. It knows my businesses, knows my coffee machine is a La Marzocco, knows we dose at 22 grams, knows our WordPress setup, knows our Mailchimp audience. It remembers things from previous conversations and uses that context automatically.

Cowork forgets everything every session. Every time you open it, it starts fresh. That’s why you need those long, detailed skill files — they’re essentially the memory. I’ve got skill files that go on forever with rules for how to handle different transactions, which suppliers go to which categories, what to do when MYOB auto-suggests the wrong thing. It works, but it’s a lot of upfront training and ongoing maintenance.

The difference shows up in surprising ways. When Viktor generated images for a blog post about espresso, it put a La Marzocco in the background because it knows that’s what we have. When I asked for an image of coffee being weighed, it put exactly 22 grams on the scale because it knows that’s our dose. That stuff wouldn’t happen with Cowork unless I explicitly told it in a skill file, and even then it tends to miss details pretty regularly.

Reliability

Viktor is more polished. It’s less buggy, things just tend to work. You message it, it does the thing, it comes back.

Cowork is still in beta and it shows. Chrome disconnects sometimes. You have to re-authorise domains. It crashes occasionally. Little things that individually aren’t a big deal, but they add up. You have to log in, give it permission, make sure it’s connected to the right window. It’s not a set-and-forget experience — at least not yet.

Computer Resources

This is a practical one that people don’t think about. Cowork runs on your actual computer. It’s using your CPU, your browser, your screen. I run it on a MacBook Air and I try not to use the computer while it’s working because the chat windows get big and it slows everything down.

Viktor runs in the cloud. It doesn’t touch my computer at all. I can give it a task and walk away. It could be 2am and Viktor is working away on something while I’m asleep. That’s a fundamentally different experience.

Transparency

Cowork wins here. You can see everything it’s doing — every click, every thought, every decision. It shows you its reasoning in real-time. When it’s reconciling a transaction, you can see it reading the invoice, checking the category, deciding what to do. If it’s about to make a mistake, you can catch it.

With Viktor, you get the end result. You don’t see the process. That’s fine for most things, but for sensitive work like accounting, seeing the thinking is important to me.

Cost

Cowork is about $200 per month (Claude subscription). Viktor is more expensive — realistically $300-$400 per month at the level I use it. Viktor uses tokens, so the more you use it, the more it costs. Once you see what it can do, you want to use it for everything, and that burns through tokens.

Both are insanely cheap compared to hiring someone. If you think about what these tools actually replace — a bookkeeper, a marketing person, a designer, a web developer — even at $400-$600 combined per month, it’s nothing. You couldn’t hire a part-time VA for that.

So Which Should You Use?

Honestly? Both. They’re not competing with each other. They solve different problems.

Use Cowork if:

Your task involves working in a browser on specific sites (accounting, ordering, data entry)
You need to see what the AI is doing and catch mistakes in real-time
The task is sensitive and you want human oversight (like accounting)
You have repetitive daily procedures that follow clear rules
You’re comfortable training it with detailed skill files

Use Viktor if:

You need creative work done (content, design, marketing)
You want to delegate and get a finished result back
You need the AI to connect multiple tools together (WordPress + Mailchimp + image generation)
Speed matters
You want the AI to remember your business context over time

For me, the combination is powerful. Cowork handles the first half of my day — the bookkeeping, the orders, the reconciliations. Viktor handles the marketing and content side. Between the two of them, I’m conservatively saving 20-25 hours per week, and getting a lot more done. That’s a part-time employee I don’t need to hire, manage, or train.

Where This Is Heading

Both tools are going to get better. Cowork will hopefully get faster and less buggy as it moves out of beta. Viktor will probably get cheaper as competition increases and token costs drop. And at some point, the line between “coworker” and “agent” will probably blur.

But right now, in early 2026, this is the state of play. Two different AI tools, two different approaches, both genuinely useful for running a real business. Not theory. Not hype. Actual work getting done every day.

If you want to follow along with what I’m doing with these tools, jump on my weekly email, or follow me on Instagram or LinkedIn.

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dan

Serial founder, owner of East Coast Roast, previously founded Black Hops Brewing, WP Curve, 7 books including The 7 Day Startup. I send a weekly email about startups, content marketing and entrepreneurship - join for free here.

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