Syntic CLI showed developers what's possible when an AI Employee runs in your environment. It moves across your files, pulls from multiple sources, and ships actual work on your behalf. It breaks complex jobs into pieces and keeps going until each one lands.
Syntic Cowork brings that same execution power to Syntic Code Desktop for knowledge work, not just code. Dispatch complex jobs that pull from multiple sources, need sustained effort, and produce real deliverables. The terminal happened to be where Syntic CLI lived. That power now runs on your desktop through a familiar interface.
What makes Syntic Cowork different from regular chats
It works in your file environment.
Cowork runs locally on your desktop and operates directly in your folders — reading, organizing, and creating files where your work actually lives. Like Syntic CLI, it works the way you do: in your filesystem, with your existing files, not just generating new artifacts. Use the Work in a folder option to point the Employee at the directory you want it to use.
It can spin up sub-agents.
Cowork breaks complex jobs across independent sub-agents that run in parallel, each with fresh context. Unlike a single chat thread where everything accumulates, each sub-agent starts clean. Larger pulls across multiple sources at once, longer jobs that don't hit context limits, and complex work where each piece gets dedicated attention before results sync up.
You can hand off and check back.
Cowork handles the orchestration — breaking work into pieces, managing context, tracking what's done — so you're not needed at every step. Hand off the job, review the approach, then let it run. The sidebar keeps you oriented: see steps as they unfold, track which tools and files are in use, watch outputs as they're created. Check in and redirect, or let it run to completion. You can also schedule jobs on a recurring cadence, so work you hand off once keeps running without you.
When to use Syntic Cowork vs regular chat
Use Syntic Cowork when:
- The work lives in your files — organizing what you have, analyzing a folder, creating outputs saved directly to your machine
- The job involves large amounts of material or many sources
- The work benefits from parallel exploration
- You want to delegate and come back to results
- The job might take longer than a typical chat session
Stay in regular chat when:
- You want real-time back-and-forth collaboration
- Tasks are quick and conversational
- You want to stay hands-on throughout
- The work is exploratory and you're thinking alongside Syntic
Try: Ask Syntic Cowork to organize your desktop. It'll ask a few questions about how you want things grouped, then get to work — a real job where the Employee acts directly in your environment.
What Syntic Cowork can do
Cowork shines when you want the Employee to take action and follow through. That might mean acting in your environment — organizing files, processing batches, converting formats. Or work too big for a single thread — research across many sources, analysis with many angles. Or something that runs all the way to completion and ships a finished deliverable.
Access local files.
Point the Employee at folders on your machine: your notes, project directories, research archives. It reads, creates, and organizes files directly.
"Organize my Downloads folder. Group by type and project."
"Find identical photos and screenshots I can delete."
Ship deliverables through deeper work.
Cowork can produce large slide decks, spreadsheets, and reports by researching across your connected tools, synthesizing the findings, and iterating on the output.
"I have a week in Lisbon. Search my email inbox and calendar for all details about the trip. Search the web for the weather, neighborhoods, restaurants, and things to do. Build an itinerary in a doc."
"I have 50+ customer feedback messages across Teams and Zendesk. Find the top complaints. Then search my SharePoint for documents I've written, and start drafting responses."
Run long jobs to completion.
Work that would get disrupted in regular chat (hitting context limits, losing the thread partway through) runs to completion in Cowork.
"Go through my entire notes vault. Find orphaned notes, surface connections I've missed, and suggest a better folder structure."
"Read every document in /contracts. Build a summary of key terms, renewal dates, and obligations for each."
Parallelize complex work.
When a job has independent parts, the Employee can spin up sub-agents to tackle them at the same time and synthesize the results.
"I'm evaluating four vendors for our team. Spin up sub-agents to research each one's pricing, support reputation, and integration options. Give me a comparison."
"Spin up sub-agents to analyze this decision from three angles: financial impact, customer experience, and operational risk. Synthesize a recommendation."
Work asynchronously.
Start a job, step away, and come back to finished work. Check progress when you want, or let the Employee run on its own.
"I have a performance review Friday. Search my Slack, Google Drive, and Asana for completed tickets, project updates, and peer feedback. Draft a meeting prep sheet."
"Look at my team meeting notes from the last quarter in Drive and review our team Slack channel. What has my team accomplished?"
Schedule recurring jobs.
Set Cowork to run on a repeating cadence — daily, weekly, or any schedule you define. A morning briefing pulled from Slack and Calendar. A weekly roundup of what shipped. A Monday flash report assembled from your connected tools. You describe the job and set when it runs, and the Employee handles it each time.
The desktop app needs to be open for scheduled jobs to run. If your computer was asleep or the app was closed when a job was due, Cowork catches up when you're back.
"Every Monday morning, check my Slack channels and calendar for the week. Summarize what's coming up and flag anything that needs prep."
"Every Friday at 4pm, pull my completed Asana tasks and draft a weekly status update. Save it to my Reports folder."
Getting started
Open Syntic Cowork from the Cowork tab in Syntic Code Desktop. Cowork is a local desktop feature for macOS and Windows, available to paid-plan users as a feature preview.
Grant folder access.
Point the Employee at directories you want it to use. It asks permission before writing.
Connect your tools.
Cowork becomes more useful with MCP connectors linking it to your real work environment.
Use Syntic for Chrome.
If you've installed Syntic for Chrome, Cowork can use it for browser-based jobs: reading web pages, filling forms, extracting data from sites without APIs, and navigating across tabs.
Tips to try
Start with prompt builders.
When you open Cowork, you'll see suggestions like "Create a file," "Crunch data," "Organize and process files," "Prep for the day." Get inspired and easily try jobs that work well in Cowork.
Think in terms of complete jobs.
Try describing a job with a specific end state. "Analyze these documents and ship a slide deck with the three main themes" gives the Employee more to work with than "help me understand this research."
Build your intuition.
Try jobs with clear boundaries — "organize this folder," "synthesize these documents" — as you build up to bigger projects. Develop a sense for what Cowork handles well, then scale up.
Current limitations
Cowork is available as a feature preview, with some known limits:
- Desktop only (macOS and Windows). Sessions don't sync to web or mobile.
- No chat sharing. Sessions stay on your machine.
- Some features aren't available yet. Chat sharing, artifact sharing, and Memory don't work with Cowork yet. You also can't switch between Cowork and regular chat mid-conversation.
Local execution means faster iteration and direct file access. Sessions stay on your device and use your machine's resources.
The bigger picture
If you've been using Syntic CLI for non-coding work, Cowork gives you the same execution power without needing to live in the terminal.
Haven't used Syntic CLI yet? Cowork on Syntic Code Desktop is a good place to start.