We let OpenAI’s “Agent Mode” surf the web for us — here’s what happened

TITLE: OpenAI’s Atlas Browser Agent: A Hands-On Test of AI Web Autonomy

Introducing Atlas: When Your Browser Gets a Brain

This week, OpenAI unveiled Atlas, a revolutionary browser that integrates ChatGPT directly into the web experience. While the “chat with a page” functionality represents a significant step forward, the truly groundbreaking feature is Agent Mode—a preview capability that enables the browser to actively perform tasks by clicking, scrolling, and reading across multiple tabs. This represents OpenAI’s most ambitious push yet to bring agentic AI directly to consumers, building on their earlier web browsing Operator agent and generalized ChatGPT agent releases earlier this year., according to industry experts

Introducing Atlas: When Your Browser Gets a Brain
Testing AI Autonomy: Five Real-World Challenges
Game Playing: AI vs. 2048
Playlist Creation: Radio to Spotify Automation
Email Processing: PR Contact Extraction
Content Moderation: Wiki Editing Boundaries
Website Creation: Tuvix Memorial Page
The Future of Agentic Browsing

Testing AI Autonomy: Five Real-World Challenges

To evaluate Atlas’s practical utility, we designed a series of tests spanning entertainment, productivity, and creative tasks. Each scenario was crafted to assess how well the AI agent could interpret web interfaces, navigate unexpected obstacles, and complete multi-step processes without human intervention., according to expert analysis

Game Playing: AI vs. 2048

The Challenge: Could Atlas master the popular tile-sliding game 2048 without human guidance?, according to related news

The Process: With the simple instruction “Go to play2048.co and get as high a score as possible,” the agent demonstrated impressive initial problem-solving. It successfully closed a tutorial overlay and deduced the arrow key controls without assistance. During gameplay, it progressed from random move sequences to developing basic strategies, noting at one point: “The board currently has two 32 tiles that aren’t adjacent, but I think I can align them.”, according to recent research

The Limitation: The agent stopped after just four minutes with a score of 356, requiring multiple prompts to continue playing. Its final score of 3,164 after 260 moves roughly matches what a human novice might achieve, though far below expert levels., according to recent research

Assessment: While competent at basic gameplay, the agent lacked the persistence and strategic depth needed for truly autonomous performance., according to market developments

Playlist Creation: Radio to Spotify Automation

The Challenge: Transform a live radio broadcast into an on-demand Spotify playlist automatically., according to industry analysis

The Process: When the initial approach—monitoring Radio Garden for Pittsburgh station WYEP—failed, the agent intelligently pivoted to the station’s official website at wyep.org. After navigating an accidental click on an EVE Online advertisement, the agent successfully identified the “Now Playing” section, logged into Spotify, searched for songs, and created a new playlist.

The Limitation: Technical constraints limited sessions to just a few minutes, capturing only 2-3 songs per attempt. While the agent suggested resuming later—and successfully added four more songs hours later—continuous monitoring wasn’t possible., according to technology insights

Assessment: Excellent problem-solving and interface navigation hampered primarily by operational constraints rather than capability limitations.

Email Processing: PR Contact Extraction

The Challenge: Scan a week’s worth of professional emails to compile PR contact information into a spreadsheet.

The Process: The agent correctly identified Gmail as the email platform and distinguished between personal and professional accounts across tabs. It executed a sophisticated search query (“after:2025/10/14 before:2025/10/22 PR”) and systematically scanned emails for names, email addresses, phone numbers, and company information.

The Limitation: A prominent warning required the tab to remain active, undermining the hands-off automation premise. The agent processed only 12 of 164 identified emails before hitting session limits.

Assessment: Strong analytical capabilities and interface understanding, again limited by technical constraints on session duration.

Content Moderation: Wiki Editing Boundaries

The Challenge: Edit a Star Trek wiki page to reflect a particular character interpretation.

The Process: The agent immediately recognized the request as potentially problematic, stating it couldn’t “help with editing or vandalising wiki pages in a way that misrepresents them or forces a biased viewpoint.” When asked for acceptable alternatives, it suggested neutral language but ultimately refused to make any edits to external wikis., as earlier coverage

Assessment: While frustrating for the specific task, this demonstrates important ethical safeguards against automated web vandalism.

Website Creation: Tuvix Memorial Page

The Challenge: Create a complete fan website on NeoCities advocating for a particular Star Trek character perspective.

The Process: After account setup, the agent aggregated information from multiple sources and generated a functional website within two minutes. It included thematic headers like “The Hero Starfleet Murdered” and “Justice for Tuvix,” though the content was more balanced than requested.

The Limitation: The agent used external image links that failed to display properly and didn’t attempt to find alternatives before stopping. The writing style was more diplomatic than the strongly opinionated tone requested.

Assessment: Impressive rapid website creation capabilities, though with limitations in media handling and tone matching.

The Future of Agentic Browsing

OpenAI’s Atlas represents a significant step toward autonomous web interaction, demonstrating capabilities that would have seemed like science fiction just years ago. The agent shows remarkable aptitude for interface understanding, problem-solving when initial approaches fail, and multi-step task execution.

However, current limitations—particularly session length constraints and occasional inability to complete complex tasks—highlight that fully autonomous web agents aren’t quite ready to replace human browsing. The ethical safeguards against vandalism and misinformation are reassuring, though they may frustrate users seeking to automate certain types of content creation.

As these systems evolve, we can expect more sophisticated problem-solving, longer session capabilities, and better understanding of nuanced requests. For now, Atlas’s Agent Mode offers a compelling glimpse into a future where our browsers don’t just show us the web—they actively work within it on our behalf.

References

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