Manus, the viral AI “agent” platform from Chinese language startup Butterfly Impact, has had an unintended facet impact: elevating the profile of one other AI device known as Browser Use.
Browser Use, which goals to make web sites extra accessible for agentic purposes that carry out duties on a person’s behalf, has skilled explosive progress prior to now week. Every day downloads greater than quintupled from round 5,000 on March 3 to twenty-eight,000 on March 10, co-creator Gregor Zunic instructed TechCrunch.
“The past few days have been really wild,” Zunic mentioned through DM. “We are the biggest trending repository [on GitHub], got loads of downloads [and] all that actually converts to big usage numbers.”
Why the uptick? A put up about how Manus leverages Browser Use garnered over 2.4 hundreds of thousands views and tons of of reshares on X. Browser Use is one of many elements Manus employs to execute numerous duties, like clicking by website menus and filling out types.
Zunic launched the eponymous firm behind Browser Use with Magnus Müller final 12 months out of ETH Zurich’s Scholar Mission Home accelerator. The pair thought internet brokers — brokers that navigate web sites and internet apps autonomously — have been going to be the “big thing” in 2025.
“What started as casual brainstorming over a few lunches turned into a challenge: let’s build something small, throw it on Hacker News, and see what happens,” Zunic mentioned. “We put together an MVP in four days, launched it, and boom — number one. From there, it’s been an absolute rocket.”
Brower Use extracts an internet site’s parts — buttons, widgets, and so forth — to permit AI fashions to extra simply work together with them. The device can handle a number of browser tabs, arrange actions like saving information and performing database operations, and deal with mouse and keyboard inputs.
Browser Use the corporate costs for managed plans, but additionally affords a free, self-hosted model of its software program. That’s the model that’s blown up within the days since Manus’ unveiling.
Zunic says he and Magnus are attempting to “sell a shovel” to builders chasing after the gold rush of internet brokers.
“We wanted to create a foundation layer that everyone will build browser agents on,” Zunic mentioned. “In our minds, there will be more agents on the web than humans by the end of the year.”
Which may sound overly bullish, however a number of analysts predict that the broader marketplace for AI brokers will certainly develop enormously within the months to come back. In accordance to Analysis and Markets, the sector will attain $42 billion in 2029. Deloitte anticipates that half of firms utilizing AI will deploy AI brokers by 2027.
Manus impact apart, Browser Use’s timing seems to have been fortuitous.
Up to date 12:45 p.m. Pacific: An earlier model of this story incorrectly referred to “Browser Use” as “Browser User” within the headline. We remorse the error.
