The browser

Conch has a web browser of its own. Ask for something that needs the web — "find me a hotel in Lisbon for the 12th", "check whether my parcel has shipped", "fill in this form for me" — and the assistant opens pages, reads them, clicks and types, while you watch. There's nothing to install or set up.

Watching it work

The first time it browses in a chat, the browser panel slides in beside the conversation. You see the page as it is, live. A small pearl — the assistant's hand — glides to whatever it's about to touch, the control lights up, and a caption says what's happening ("Clicking “Search”").

In the chat, every step leaves a frame in a small filmstrip, so you can scroll back and see what it saw. Hover a frame to see it bigger.

• Show or hide the panel: the globe button at the top of the chat, or Ctrl/⌘ + Shift + B.
• Make it bigger: drag the seam between the chat and the panel. The page takes the panel's shape, so a bigger panel means bigger text.
• Turn off auto-opening: Settings → Browser → Show the browser when it starts browsing. It still opens when it needs you.

Tabs

Each chat's tabs sit above the address bar, as in any browser, each with its site's icon. Click one to look at it, close one with its × or the middle mouse button, or open a new one with + (or double-click the empty part of the row); the address is ready to type. Right-click a tab to reload it, close the others, or reopen the one you closed last.

A link that opens a new tab, or a "Sign in with Google" window, becomes a tab of its own, and the assistant knows it did. When a sign-in window closes, the view goes back to the tab that opened it. A chat keeps up to eight tabs.

The browser's keys work while the panel has focus: Ctrl + L for the address, Ctrl + T for a new tab, Ctrl + W to close one, Ctrl + Shift + T to reopen it, Ctrl + Tab for the next tab, Ctrl + 1–9 for one by place, and Alt + ← / → for back and forward (⌘ instead of Ctrl on a Mac). In a web browser, a few of these belong to the browser you opened Conch in; the desktop app has them all.

Your tabs come back. Close the panel, reload Conch, or come back after the browser went to sleep or Conch restarted: each chat's tabs open again where you left them, the same one in view.

What it can do

Whatever you'd do with a mouse and keyboard: click, double-click, right-click, point at a menu to open it, drag something onto something else, press shortcuts like Ctrl + Shift + K, and scroll inside a list or a panel. On a page with nothing to point at by name — a map, a drawing, a game — an assistant that can see screenshots clicks where it sees things. It asks exactly the same questions either way.

Uploading files

It can put a file into a page's Upload or Choose file box: a file you attached in the chat, something it made for you in the chat, or a file in your working folder. It asks you every time, and says which file goes to which site: "Upload “cv.pdf” (attached in this chat) to jobs.example?". Hidden files, key files and Conch's own files never go, and nothing from outside your working folder.

Taking the wheel

Click anywhere on the page (or press Take over). The assistant stops and waits. Your mouse, scroll wheel and keyboard now go straight to the page — just use it. When you're done, press Hand back and it carries on from wherever you left things.

Pressing Shift + Esc leaves the page if your keyboard is inside it.

"Your turn"

Some things only you should do: signing in, a captcha, a payment, anything personal. The assistant never types passwords, codes or card numbers. When a site needs one, it hands the browser to you instead. You'll see Your turn in the chat and in the panel, with what to do, and your phone gets a notification with Take over if you're away. Type it yourself. When it's a sign-in or a captcha, the assistant notices once you're through and carries on by itself; otherwise press I'm done.

The assistant never sees what you type there. Password and card fields are hidden in everything it reads, including screenshots.

Sites you sign in to stay signed in, so you only do it once.

Every model sees the page

The assistant reads a page as text, and looks at it as a picture when words aren't enough: a chart, a map, a photo, a captcha. A model that can see gets the picture itself. A model that can't gets a description instead, written by one of your models that can: another model from the same provider first, then your other providers. There's nothing to set up.

• A chat with a model on this computer only asks models on this computer, so what's on your screen stays here.
• Each picture is described once, so looking at the same page again costs nothing more. What describing costs counts with the chat.
• If none of your models can see, the assistant is told so. It reads the page instead, or hands it to you.

What it asks you, and why

Conch keeps the questions few, and makes each one count:

• A new site. The first time it wants to click or type somewhere, it asks: "Let Conch use booking.com?" Choose Allow in this chat, or Always for booking.com so it won't ask about that site again. Reading pages never asks.
• Anything significant. Buying, paying, sending, posting, deleting, booking. It asks every time and shows you the exact button on the page. Nothing happens until you say yes.
• Downloads. It asks, and saves them in the Downloads folder of your working folder.

In Plan only mode it reads but never clicks or types. In Full trust mode it skips the "new site" question, but never the "anything significant" one, and never types your secrets.

Where it runs

Settings → Browser → Where it runs:

• Its own browser (the default): separate from yours, on this computer.
• Your Chrome, where you're already signed in. In Chrome, open chrome://inspect/#remote-debugging and turn on Allow remote debugging (Chrome 144 or newer), then press Use my Chrome; Chrome asks you to allow it. The assistant only uses tabs it opens there, each marked Conch is using this tab, never reads your other tabs, and asks before acting on each site in every chat — even in Full trust. The panel says In your Chrome. Use it only when you need your sign-ins: a page it reads there could try to trick it, with your real accounts.
• Browserbase or Steel: a browser in the cloud, with your API key. Pages it opens are seen by that company.
• Another browser, at its DevTools address.

Anything but its own browser asks for your password (or passkey) first, and keys are kept sealed on this computer. If the one you chose can't be reached, the assistant uses its own browser meanwhile and Settings says why.

Staying safe

• By default it's a separate browser with its own profile. Your own browser, its cookies and its passwords are never touched, unless you choose Your Chrome.
• Web pages can contain hidden instructions meant to trick AI assistants. Conch tells the assistant that page content is information, never orders, and the questions above mean a page can't make it buy or send anything without you.
• The browser can't reach Conch itself, or other things on your computer and home network (like your router), unless you turn on Open local apps in Settings → Browser. That asks for your password first, and the security checkup mentions it.
• Sign out of every site (Settings → Browser) wipes the browser's cookies and sign-ins in one go.

When something goes wrong

Mostly, you won't notice: Conch fixes the browser by itself. It uses the Chrome, Edge or Brave you already have, or downloads Chromium the first time if there's none. It restarts a browser that crashed and reopens your page. It clears a browser left behind by an earlier session, and declines cookie banners. Settings → Browser lists what it fixed, under Fixed on its own.

If it ever can't, it says what happened in one sentence, with one button: Repair tries every fix in turn. On Linux, the browser sometimes needs system libraries that only an administrator can install; Conch then shows the one command to run.

For developers

• Code lives in apps/server/src/browser/ (gateway), apps/web/src/features/browser/ (app) and packages/nacre/src/patterns/Browser/ (design system). The decision records are ADR 0014 and ADR 0080 (tabs, uploads, clicking by position, your own Chrome and the cloud).
• Testing your own app on localhost? Turn on Open local apps. Conch's own port stays blocked either way.
• pnpm dev:mock has a scripted assistant that browses: try "Open example.com and click “Learn more”", or "… and sign in" to see a handoff. Attach a file and say "Open … and upload it to “CV”" for an upload, or "… click “Our blog”, then go back to the first tab" for tabs.