Perplexity’s personal computer came to Mac first because it was best at deploying the agentic AI platform locally, the company said.
During Apple’s quarterly financial results. CFO Kevan Parekh referenced the growing use of the Mac as a base of operations for AI platforms. Parekh named Perplexity as one such company, leveraging Apple Silicon and its unified memory structure.
Ahead of Apple’s earnings release and analyst call, Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas spoke about the Mac at his Ask NYC business and financial event. Specifically, how Personal Computer, its agentic AI platform that works with local files, was designed for use on Mac.
The Personal Computer is a version of Perplexity’s computer that uses multiple agents to perform tasks for the user. A key difference is that it manages tasks from a local computer, such as a Mac mini, instead of the cloud.
The local nature of the tool also means that it has access to the user’s files on the Mac mini, and is able to create and modify them depending on the task at hand.
Deployment capacity and interconnectivity
Considered one of the best and most accessible ways to deploy a personal computer, the Mac mini has been grabbed by users in an effort to bring Perplexity’s AI system into their homes and offices. It is a combination of the cloud-based service and user-owned local files working in a single hybrid setup.
For Perplexity, the Mac mini is one of the “best ways to deploy a “personal computer” at full capacity. With the nature of the work spanning iPhone and Mac, Personal Computer “relies on the continuity that Apple users already expect” to accomplish their tasks.
This continuity between iPhone and Mac is important, especially since users can command their personal computer to perform tasks on their Mac from their iPhone.
Since its launch in March, Computer has successfully completed over $2.8 billion in labor-equivalent work. In the case of Perplexity itself, the dogfoods team is using Personal Computer, claiming to increase its revenue fivefold while increasing its headcount by 34%.
The event also included a number of other personal computer announcements. The experience is now integrated into Microsoft Teams, with a personal computer able to receive a message directly or be integrated into a channel without leaving a conversation.
Connections and application workflows
There is also a beta version of Computer in Excel with a native side panel, so the model and data can be viewed side by side in the spreadsheet. Perplexity also works with 1Password to allow the computer to perform actions in password-protected tools, while preventing the model from seeing the user’s credentials.
Workflows in desktop will help consolidate prompts, context, and output format for specific business tasks into a single starting point. The idea is to reduce the amount of technical work a user has to do before the AI platform starts.
A library of workflows is being built for commonly performed tasks, there are currently over 70 of them. They can also be shared between team members, scheduled separately, customized and also run asynchronously.
The Personal Computer feature is available to all Perplexity Pro, Max, and Enterprise subscribers using a Mac. Pricing starts at $17 per month for Pro and $167 per month for Max.
As for anyone who wants to get a Mac mini or a Mac Studio to enjoy it for themselves, they may have a little difficulty doing so. During the call, it was revealed that Apple was facing huge demand and supply constraints that would persist for several months.