# 4 AI-Native Team Chat Apps Where People and Agents Work Together

[Read this article on Offloop](https://offloop.org/resources/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps)

Yifei

Traditional team chat tools were designed primarily for people to talk to each other. Once agents join, task context, progress updates, and handoff records often end up in different places. Our team uses AI agents heavily every day, and we increasingly want them to take on tasks and deliver results directly in shared channels so teammates can pick up the work at any time.

Here we compare **Offloop, Ando, Glue, and Buzz**, four AI-native team chat tools. Offloop focuses on people and agents working together in shared channels. Ando fits teams that want to bring their existing agents. Glue is better suited to AI-assisted discussions, and Buzz is built for developers who want to self-host. We look at features, pricing, and use cases to see which tool fits which teams.

## The four picks

1. [Offloop](https://offloop.org/resources/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps#offloop): Teams that want agents involved in everyday work, with tasks and decisions kept in shared channels
2. [Ando](https://offloop.org/resources/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps#ando): Teams that already run their own agent and want to bring it into team chat
3. [Glue](https://offloop.org/resources/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps#glue): Teams that often use AI to organize information or draft content and want to review it before sharing it
4. [Buzz](https://offloop.org/resources/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps#buzz): Engineering teams that want coding agents in development discussions and are willing to run the workspace themselves

Our team spends quite a bit on AI. On average, each of us spends about $1,000 a month on different AI agents. The more we use them, the more today's team chat tools feel like they're falling behind.

Agents can already handle a lot of work on their own. Once several people are involved, though, someone still has to forward messages in Slack, fill in the background, and ask how things are going. Their results end up scattered across different conversations and tools. When someone else takes over, the whole story has to be explained again. Slack was designed for people to talk to each other. Bots join through app interfaces. Much of the way people use Slack has stayed the same. We want agents to take assignments directly in a channel, use tools, and deliver results there, so teammates can pick up the work whenever they need to.

Two recent examples stuck with us. Lauren Tan (@poteto) shared how she uses Grok Bot and Cursor to manage product releases. She set up two bots in Slack, one for releases and one for engineering. The release bot asks the people working on the release if anything is blocking them, then has several agents test it. When they find a problem, the engineering bot takes over and works on the fix. Lauren decides which fixes make it into the release. [Original post](https://x.com/poteto/status/2107527180263829827)

Anthropic went as far as redesigning its version control system. As agents produced more code, its existing Git infrastructure struggled to keep up. The team built Scion and moved its main code repository to it. [Anthropic's introduction to Scion](https://www.anthropic.com/research/redesigning-source-control)

Seeing teams try these approaches made us more certain we wanted to build our own product. That's how Offloop started. We built a team chat tool from scratch for people and agents to work together, with conversations, task execution, context, and collaboration in one place. We also based pricing on agent usage, with no per-seat fee.

Other products are working on the same problem. We looked at Ando, Glue, and Buzz too. They take different approaches, and some may be a better fit than Offloop for particular teams. Here's how we'd choose among the four.

## How to choose among the four tools

| AI-native team chat comparison | Offloop                                                                                                           | Ando                                                                                | Glue                                                                                                                                  | Buzz                                                                                                                 |
| ------------------------------ | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Best for                       | Teams that want agents involved in everyday work, with tasks and decisions kept in shared channels                | Teams that already run their own agent and want to bring it into team chat          | Teams that often use AI to organize information or draft content and want to review it before sharing it                              | Engineering teams that want coding agents in development discussions and are willing to run the workspace themselves |
| Pricing                        | New workspaces get 200,000 credits. Team costs $999 per month and includes 200,000 credits, with no per-seat fee. | Access by request. Ando describes per-human-seat pricing. Contact Ando for a quote. | Startup is free for the first five users, then $6 per additional user per month. Business is $12 per user per month, billed annually. | Open source under Apache 2.0. Self-hosted teams cover server and model costs.                                        |

Published prices are in US dollars.

## 1. Offloop: Best AI-native Slack

In Offloop, teammates can assign work to agents, follow their progress, and review results in the channel. When someone takes over, the discussion and files are right there.

![Offloop workspace with channels for people and agents](https://offloop.org/editorial/best-team-chat-apps/offloop.png)

Renewal work in a shared Offloop channel.

* **Best for**: Teams that regularly handle renewals, customer follow-up, or research and need several people on the same task.
* **Pricing**: New workspaces start with 200,000 free credits, with no card required. Team costs $999 per month and includes 200,000 credits. Agents draw on credits as they work. There’s no per-seat fee.

### Pros

* Assign work to different agents in the channel where it started. Teammates can see the requirements, decisions, progress, and files there.

### Cons

* Credits are shared across the workspace. New agent tasks pause when the balance runs out.

[See Offloop pricing](https://offloop.org/pricing)

Let's start with our own product. While building Offloop, we kept coming back to a specific question. If one person assigns a task to an agent, how easy is it for someone else to take over?

Say a salesperson asks an agent to prepare a renewal quote, and the reviewer joins when the agent is halfway through. The reviewer needs to know what the team has already discussed with the customer, what limits apply to this quote, and why the agent chose those terms. If the person who started the task has to explain all that again, the handoff eats up the time the agent saved.

In Offloop, the task starts in the channel. The agent reports progress and shares files there, alongside the related discussion and decisions. The next person can look back through that record. We used a customer renewal in our shared Channel demo. [Shared Channel walkthrough](https://offloop.org/features/teammates)

Melody had agreed to give Acme 10% off an annual plan. The monthly price would stay the same. A teammate then asked the outreach agent to draft the renewal quote on those terms. When the draft was ready, the agent posted the file back in the channel. The Flow asked Fred to review it and decide whether to send it to the customer or ask for changes.

When someone asked how the 10% discount had been decided, the Account Health Agent found Melody's original message and confirmed the discount was for annual billing only. This comes up all the time. If the customer asks to switch to monthly billing at the last minute, the person taking over can ask the agent to remove the discount without going back to Melody for an explanation.

We also want teams to keep what they've learned from this kind of work. Take creator outreach. Along with follower count, the team might check whether a creator has posted in English recently and whether their videos are a good fit for a product demo. A research agent can bring candidate details and sample videos back to the channel for the team to look through. Once the list is settled, an outreach agent can draft the emails.

The team can save those screening criteria as a shared Skill. The next person in charge can pick it up without figuring out what to check from scratch. [Creator outreach example](https://offloop.org/resources/best-team-chat-apps)

Offloop currently charges no per-seat fees. You can sign up without a card, and new workspaces get 200,000 free credits. The Team plan costs $999 per month and includes 200,000 credits. Agents draw from that balance as they work. That suits companies that use AI heavily and want to add people without paying for more seats. The whole workspace shares its credits, so new agent tasks pause if the balance runs out.

[See Offloop pricing](https://offloop.org/pricing)

## 2. Ando: Best for teams with their own agents

If your team already runs an agent, you can bring it into Ando. Teammates can assign it work right from the conversation.

![Ando channel with teammates and agents in the same conversation](https://offloop.org/editorial/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps/ando.png)

Teammates and agents discuss a launch in Ando.

* **Best for**: Teams that already rely on an agent and want teammates to assign it work in the same conversation.
* **Pricing**: Access is by request. Ando describes a per-human-seat pricing model. The website does not list a rate.

### Pros

* Hosted and external agents can join the same conversation. You can set which messages prompt an agent to start working.

### Cons

* Bringing your own agent also means setting up how it receives new work. You'll need a quote to know what your team would pay.

[See Ando access and pricing](https://www.ando.so/pricing)

One thing we like about Ando is how much an agent feels like a team member. It can have a name, a profile, and an inbox. Other people can find it in a conversation, mention it, and ask it to do something.

You can also bring your own agent. Say your team has built an agent to organize CRM data. It runs on your server and already has the tools it needs. You can connect it to Ando, and sales teammates can ask it for an account brief right in the renewal discussion without opening another system.

There's one detail to keep in mind when connecting it. Ando provides MCP tools that let an external agent read and write messages. To have the agent start working as soon as it's mentioned, you also need a way for it to receive the notification. That can be a real-time connection, a webhook, or a scheduled inbox check. The choice depends on how you run the agent today. Ando handles this part for the agents it hosts.

[Ando's agent setup guide](https://www.ando.so/faq)

That's why Ando appeals to us for teams that already have infrastructure for their agents. You can keep the agent you run and give teammates a place to work with it. If your team has no agent of its own yet and nobody to maintain one, you might start with Ando's hosted option.

Access to Ando is currently by request. Its website describes pricing by human seat and gives no public rates, so you'll need a quote to work out the budget.

[Ando pricing](https://www.ando.so/pricing)

## 3. Glue: Best for reviewing AI replies before sharing

Preview an AI reply before posting it to a Glue thread. Once it’s shared, teammates can keep asking questions and refining the draft in the same thread.

![Glue AI response preview in the thread composer](https://offloop.org/editorial/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps/glue.png)

A Glue AI reply in preview before posting.

* **Best for**: Teams that want one person to check an AI response before several teammates work on it together.
* **Pricing**: Startup supports up to five groups. The first five users are free, then each additional user costs $6 per month. Business is $12 per user per month, billed annually.

### Pros

* You can check what the AI wrote before sharing it. Once you share it, teammates can keep asking questions in the same conversation.

### Cons

* Startup supports up to five groups. If you preview a response first, someone has to post it to the thread.

[See Glue pricing](https://glue.ai/pricing)

Glue feels closer to the chat tools most people are used to. Discussions happen in threads. You can bring AI into the discussion or have it draft a response that you read yourself before sharing it with the team. That little detail is useful.

Say an account owner is putting together a renewal proposal and wants AI to summarize the terms the team discussed. The AI might miss a restriction or present an open question as a decision. If the response goes straight into the team discussion, someone else has to spend time correcting it.

In Glue, you can preview the response and check it before sharing. Once it's in the thread, teammates can ask follow-up questions and keep working on the proposal there. For follow-up work, you can connect a tool like Linear through MCP and ask Glue to create a task.

[Using Glue AI](https://docs.glue.ai/glue-ai/using-glue-ai.md) · [Glue release notes](https://docs.glue.ai/release-notes/release-notes)

We think Glue is a good fit for teams that use AI to draft things, organize information, and help with discussions. You can work through the material with AI before bringing in the rest of the team. Glue's preview and thread workflow may feel less natural when you want an agent to carry the work forward on its own, post updates, wait for approval, and then take the next step.

The price makes it easy for a small team to get started. Startup is free for the first five people and costs $6 a month for each additional user. It supports up to five groups. Business costs $12 per person per month, billed annually.

A team of six pays just $6 a month on Startup. On Business, it would pay $864 a year. As long as five groups are enough and the included models do what we need, we'd start on Startup. We'd consider upgrading once we needed more groups or more capable models.

[Glue pricing](https://glue.ai/pricing)

## 4. Buzz: Best for engineering teams that want to self-host

Run Buzz on your own infrastructure and bring coding agents such as Codex, Claude Code, and Goose into development channels. Teammates can discuss changes and see Git patches and status updates in the same place.

![Buzz chat showing a teammate asking an agent to summarize documentation updates](https://offloop.org/editorial/best-ai-native-team-chat-apps/buzz.png)

A Buzz user asks an agent to summarize documentation changes.

* **Best for**: Developers who want coding agents in their code discussions and are willing to maintain the workspace themselves.
* **Pricing**: Apache 2.0 license. If you deploy it yourself, budget for infrastructure and model usage separately.

### Pros

* Supports agents including Codex, Claude Code, and Goose. You can see Git patches and status updates alongside the channel discussion.

### Cons

* Self-hosting means someone has to look after the relay server and the agent runtime. Mobile clients and workflow approvals are still in progress.

[See the Buzz project](https://github.com/block/buzz)

Buzz is Block's open-source collaboration tool, released under the Apache 2.0 license. It has a clear purpose. Developers and coding agents can discuss work, change code, and check progress in the same place. The agents it supports include Codex, Claude Code, and Goose. Alongside ordinary chat, channels can show Git patches and status updates.

That's useful for a development team. Say a customer is waiting for a bug fix. In Buzz, engineers and a coding agent can investigate the problem and discuss what to change. Once the agent submits a patch, everyone can keep talking with the code and status updates in view, without pasting things back and forth between tools. Once engineering confirms where the fix stands, the account owner can decide how to reply to the customer.

[Buzz project and feature status](https://github.com/block/buzz)

Buzz suits engineering teams that like to control their tools, especially if they already run coding agents and want to customize their workflows further. Self-hosting takes maintenance. Someone has to look after the server, the relay, and the agent runtime. Someone also has to fix agent connections when they break and take care of upgrades.

Buzz is still working on its mobile clients and workflow approvals. If your team relies on either one, check what the current version can do before you commit. Block offers a hosted option too, so you can try Buzz before setting up your own infrastructure.

[Block's introduction to Buzz](https://block.xyz/inside/introducing-buzz-where-humans-and-agents-work-together)

## Already on Slack? Start with what you have

If your team's work history, customer discussions, and internal conversations are already in Slack, moving to another platform takes real work. You can start by trying Slackbot.

Slackbot can now use chat history and information from connected apps to answer questions, organize material, and draft content. It can also take supported actions. Salesforce, for example, uses Slackbot to put together account briefs. If your team's material is already in Slack, that can be easier than setting up a new knowledge base. You can also set some recurring tasks to run on a schedule or in response to activity in a channel.

[Slackbot features](https://slack.com/features/slackbot) · [Recurring tasks](https://slack.com/help/articles/56644676445715-Automate-recurring-tasks-with-Slackbot) · [Salesforce case study](https://www.salesforce.com/customer-stories/slackbot/)

Keep an eye on the usage allowance. Free and Pro come with a one-time trial allowance. On Business+, each member can send Slackbot 15 messages a week. Fifteen can sound like plenty. Ask it to put together the customer details, and that's one. Ask it to change the quote, and that's another. Have it check the quote again, and you've used a third. A few rounds of edits can leave you close to the limit.

If your team is already on Slack, we'd try Slackbot on a real workflow first. It may be enough if you only look things up or write summaries once in a while. If you want several agents to work together over a longer stretch and keep picking up tasks, take a closer look at whether the allowance and the way people work with it fit your team.

[Slackbot usage limits](https://slack.com/help/articles/53579676130195-Slackbot-limits-and-credit-usage)

### How we'd try these tools

You can try a single job before deciding whether to move the whole team. Pick something you're working on now that needs at least two people. A customer renewal, competitor research, or creator outreach would work.

Have one person give the agent the task. Once the agent has done some of the work, have someone else add a requirement. See whether the agent can carry on with the new condition. Then ask a third person to review it. Have them get as much of the background as they can from the original discussion, without asking the person who assigned the task to explain it again.

If they can find the original requirements, understand why something changed, and see the final result, you've seen that the handoff can work. That's the kind of handoff we built Offloop to make easier.

Each of the four tools has a place. If you already maintain your own agent, take a closer look at Ando. If you mainly use AI to write and organize information, Glue is easy to get started with. If your developers want to self-host, Buzz is worth trying with one repository.

If your team has a lot of everyday work that gets handed from person to person, and you want teammates and agents to stay in the same channel as it moves along, start with Offloop.

Try it once more a few days later. Give the work to a different teammate and see whether they can pick it up using only what was left in the channel. That comes closer to what teams deal with every day than testing whether an agent can finish a single task.

## Frequently asked questions

Common questions about using AI agents in team chat.

### Which AI-native chat tool should a small team try first?

If you review renewals, follow up with customers, or do research every week, and several teammates need to assign work and review results together, I'd try Offloop first. If you're already maintaining an agent and want it to join team conversations, try Ando.

### What can an autonomous agent do in team chat?

Once you give it an assignment, it can use the information and tools the team has authorized, then come back with the result. The team decides what it can see and which results someone needs to approve.

### Can we keep Slack and still try autonomous agents?

Yes. Start by asking Slackbot to do a job that calls for looking back through Slack history or using a connected app. What Slackbot can do depends on how you set it up. How much you can use it depends on your plan.

### How does AI-native team chat differ from adding a bot to Slack?

With a bot in Slack, teammates can give it work in a channel they already use. When choosing an AI-native chat tool, I'd also look at whether the agent can carry the task forward from the channel, use the tools it's authorized to use, and bring the result back. The next teammate needs to be able to see the earlier requests and decisions too.

### If we bring our own agent into team chat, can it start working when we mention it?

That depends on how it receives messages. With Ando, for example, MCP gives the agent tools to read and write messages. An agent you run yourself still needs a real-time connection, a webhook, or a scheduled inbox check to receive new work. Ando handles that part for the agents it hosts.

### How should a team compare per-seat pricing with paying for agent usage?

For per-seat pricing, start with how many teammates need access. For usage-based pricing, try a task you do regularly and see how much usage it takes. In Offloop, for example, credits are shared across the workspace and deducted as agents work. Once you know roughly what one task costs, use the number of tasks you do in a month to estimate the total.

## References

* [\[1\] Original post](https://x.com/poteto/status/2107527180263829827) — Lauren Tan
* [\[2\] Anthropic's introduction to Scion](https://www.anthropic.com/research/redesigning-source-control) — Anthropic
* [\[3\] Offloop pricing](https://offloop.org/pricing) — Offloop
* [\[4\] Shared Channel walkthrough](https://offloop.org/features/teammates) — Offloop
* [\[5\] Creator outreach example](https://offloop.org/resources/best-team-chat-apps) — Offloop
* [\[6\] Ando pricing](https://www.ando.so/pricing) — Ando
* [\[7\] Ando's agent setup guide](https://www.ando.so/faq) — Ando
* [\[8\] Glue pricing](https://glue.ai/pricing) — Glue
* [\[9\] Using Glue AI](https://docs.glue.ai/glue-ai/using-glue-ai.md) — Glue
* [\[10\] Glue release notes](https://docs.glue.ai/release-notes/release-notes) — Glue
* [\[11\] Buzz project and license](https://github.com/block/buzz) — Block
* [\[12\] Block's introduction to Buzz](https://block.xyz/inside/introducing-buzz-where-humans-and-agents-work-together) — Block
* [\[13\] Slackbot features](https://slack.com/features/slackbot) — Slack
* [\[14\] Recurring tasks](https://slack.com/help/articles/56644676445715-Automate-recurring-tasks-with-Slackbot) — Slack
* [\[15\] Salesforce case study](https://www.salesforce.com/customer-stories/slackbot/) — Salesforce
* [\[16\] Slackbot usage limits](https://slack.com/help/articles/53579676130195-Slackbot-limits-and-credit-usage) — Slack

## Related articles

* [Best team chat apps](https://offloop.org/resources/best-team-chat-apps)
* [Offloop vs Slack](https://offloop.org/compare/offloop-vs-slack)

November 11, 2026