I just tried ChatGPT's new 'Scheduled Tasks' feature and it's the closest thing yet to a real AI assistant

Date:
Thu, 25 Jun 2026 09:46:19 +0000

Description:
ChatGPT's new Scheduled Tasks feature transforms the chatbot into something that is closer to a real AI assistant.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Threads Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter ChatGPT's new Scheduled Tasks feature announcement this week the ability for ChatGPT to now send
reminders, handle recurring work, or monitor things caught my attention immediately.

After all, AI assistants are all predicated on being reactive and needing
your initial input. No matter how sophisticated the technology becomes, the responsibility usually remains firmly on your side of the screen. But if they are to truly be assistants, they have to be able to help you out when you might not remember to ask for their help. Scheduled Tasks do require your input to begin with, of course. But you can't tell ChatGPT to remind you
about something later. You can ask it to send recurring updates. You can keep an eye on a topic and notify you when something changes. Latest Videos From Watch full video here:

Unlike a lot of ChatGPT features, this one truly seems to give ChatGPT more
of an actual assistant feel. How to start using Scheduled Tasks I started
with a basic reminder of something I frequently forget. I asked ChatGPT to remind me to practice my saxophone three evenings each week. You may like I gave ChatGPT 7 extra words and the answers instantly got better I used
ChatGPT to lighten my weekly mental load and it worked surprisingly well I sent an email without opening Gmail thanks to ChatGPT then I found the catch

Again, the setup was conversational. There were no complicated menus or automation builders. I simply described what I wanted. ChatGPT replied, "I'll remind you to practice saxophone three evenings per week. I'll keep the reminders encouraging and focused on making consistent progress."

Your Scheduled Tasks are all accessible from a new left-hand menu item, nestled between Projects and Apps, provided you are a ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Business, or Enterprise user. If you click the menu option then ChatGPT will suggest some things to try with Scheduled Tasks. Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over.

That evening I received the first reminder, with a couple of links suggesting songs to learn. Exactly the kind of thing that will help keep me on track.

If you've enabled notifications for the ChatGPT app on your phone, you'll get a notification that your scheduled task has completed. If you're using
ChatGPT in a browser then turn on Desktop Notifications when it asks you. If email notifications are enabled for scheduled tasks in your ChatGPT settings, you'll also receive the result by email.

I then set up a more complicated evening reminder. I wanted a suggestion sent every day at 4 p.m. for a short but fun game to play outside with my child. The idea was to outsource a small piece of the fretting I sometimes feel to keep young kids entertained. Happily, not long before he returned home from daycare, ChatGPT suggested a fun and even slightly educational game of dinosaurs which he loved because of getting to run around and roar, but also helped him learn the names of several dinosaur species. What to read next I gamified chores with ChatGPT I use the 'assignment' prompt to skip any
ChatGPT confusion How to make ChatGPT great at writing your emails Getting a useful morning briefing My third test was set for overnight. I told ChatGPT that I wanted a quick summary of local events or critical information to know every weekday morning at 8 a.m. Normally, this would involve checking several websites and social media. ChatGPT agreed to do so, and this morning I got a roundup of not only the day's weather, but details of yesterday's election news, the upcoming World Cup games, and how they might affect traffic.

Plenty of apps can recommend activities. What mattered was that the
suggestion appeared before I had even started thinking about them or when it felt too late. Throughout the day, I kept noticing the same thing. Scheduled tasks were not saving enormous amounts of time. They were saving small
moments of mental effort. Each individual task removed one tiny obligation from my internal to-do list.

That is the subtle trick scheduled tasks pull off so well. Instead of responding to a need, it anticipates one. Countless services can handle individual pieces of what happened during those two days. What felt different was having everything tied to the same conversation. That may be why the feature works better than you might expect. It remembers things so that you
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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/ai-platforms-assistants/i-just-tried-chatgpts-new-sc heduled-tasks-feature-and-its-the-closest-thing-yet-to-a-real-ai-assistant


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