Last updated: May 2026
Claude Cowork excels at deep reasoning, complex writing, and code refactoring inside Anthropic's 200K+ token window. It is ideal for focused deep work in Word, Excel, and desktop apps.
Vellum is designed for continuous daily task execution. It runs ambiently in the background, follows schedules, monitors feeds, and operates across all your apps without draining your monthly reasoning tokens.
Claude Cowork is centered on desktop environments and M365 add-ins, tied directly to your active Claude Pro, Team, or Enterprise subscription.
Vellum provides seamless multi-device continuity. Start a task by voice on your iPhone, check progress on your Mac, and get status updates in Slack or Telegram with one shared assistant.
Claude Cowork is hosted entirely in Anthropic's cloud with commercial zero-data-retention terms on eligible tiers, but cannot run offline on local hardware.
Vellum gives you full architectural flexibility: run entirely offline with local open-weight models, or use Vellum Cloud with isolated credential vaults that keep your logins private.
Migrate everything that matters to Vellum with our import tool!
iOS app with Home Screen widgets, native Mac app, web app, voice, email, Slack, Telegram, Microsoft Teams, and Discord, now an official channel with a setup wizard. Sent messages can be edited in place in Slack and Telegram. Every surface shares the same memory and identity.
Claude desktop app on Mac and Windows, with mobile entry through the Claude app on iOS and Android. Chrome via connector.
Build me a habit tracker gets you a working, interactive app in the conversation. Read this page uses the browser extension to read your open tabs and act on the page you are looking at. Call the dentist and reschedule places an actual phone call with its own voice.
Analyzes massive context windows, edits code, and navigates desktop screens via Claude Computer Use. Native M365 add-ins integrate into Word and Excel.
Run on-device as a native Mac app, on Vellum's managed cloud, or self-host on your own VPS.
Runs locally inside the Claude desktop app. Models served from Anthropic's infrastructure. No self-host option.
Native agent skills plus 1-click integrations with 50+ services through managed OAuth, including native Calendly and Eventbrite. Your assistant acts in real services without you touching tokens or API keys.
Native connectors for Google Drive, Gmail, Slack, DocuSign, FactSet, Linear, Jira, and Chrome. Custom MCP support.
Vellum builds a structured memory of your projects, people, and preferences automatically, across every surface. It sharpens with every conversation and correction, and there is nothing to configure: no files to curate, no engine to pick, no embedding provider to wire up.
Each Cowork task is a working session you steer. No persistent personal memory layer across tasks or sessions.
Builds its own skills, learns your tone, and adapts based on what you reward and correct. Install new skills from a growing library, or just ask and it figures out a way.
Skills system and customizable plugins. Plugins encode workflows for domains like finance, engineering, or HR.
Open source under MIT license. Full codebase available on GitHub.
Proprietary. Closed-source SaaS from Anthropic. Source code not available.
Free Base plan with free credits to start. Paid plans from $30/mo (Mighty), $100 (Super), and $200 (Ultra) with pay-as-you-go credits, configurable compute and storage, and your assistant's own email and subdomain on higher tiers.
Included on Claude paid plans: Pro $20/mo, Max $100 to $200/mo, Team about $25/seat, Enterprise custom. Usage caps apply.
Run locally on Mac, in Vellum Cloud, or self-host. Vellum never has access to your data on any deployment path.
Runs on your local machine but processes through Anthropic's infrastructure under its enterprise data policies.
Built-in scheduling for daily briefings, weekly reports, and hourly checks that just run on a cadence.
Recurring tasks supported. Define cadence once and Claude runs it on schedule, like a weekly Slack digest.
Credentials live in an isolated vault and never enter the model layer, so prompt injection can't exfiltrate your keys. Every sensitive action asks permission with a risk badge before it runs, and guardian approvals land in one inbox.
Sandboxed via Apple VZVirtualMachine with explicit folder permissions. Audit logs and Compliance API not yet captured.
No terminal, no API keys, no daemon. Voice-first onboarding is the default: your first experience is speaking, not configuring. Free, no credit card, up in minutes.
Available immediately on any paid Claude plan. Sign in, select a folder for sandboxed access, start tasks.
Vellum Cloud: 3 GB RAM and 4 GB storage by default. Mac app runs on standard Mac hardware.
Runs inside the Claude desktop app. No published minimum specs for Cowork specifically.
Every sensitive action asks first with a risk badge, guardian approvals land in one inbox, and you can export or delete your data at any time. The trust model is written down in the docs.
Enterprise data policies, prompt-injection filters, and Team workspace permissions. All data is processed within Anthropic cloud infrastructure.
See how every personal AI assistant stacks up across the categories that matter.
See how Vellum compares to other AI assistants easily.
Choose Vellum if you want a persistent personal AI assistant that builds memory of your work and people over time, runs proactively in the background, and shows up across native Mac app, iOS, web app, voice, email, Telegram, and Slack with one shared memory. Vellum executes real actions through managed OAuth on 50+ services and runs scheduled work continuously in Vellum Cloud, not only during a steered session at your desk.
Claude Cowork is Anthropic's agentic mode for knowledge work inside the Claude desktop app. If you already pay for Claude Pro, Max, Team, or Enterprise and primarily want to delegate self-contained desktop tasks like reformatting files, drafting reports from source documents, or organizing folders, Cowork covers that working-session pattern well.
Claude Cowork is included on paid Claude plans: Pro at $20/mo, Team at roughly $25 per seat/mo, and Max tiers ($100 to $200/mo). Execution consumes from your shared monthly Claude token allowance across Chat, Code, and Cowork. Vellum includes free cloud hosting when you sign up, with paid plans upgrading your assistant's compute and storage: Mighty at $30/mo, Super at $100/mo (plus $10 platform fee), Ultra at $200/mo (plus $10 platform fee), and Custom.
Vellum builds a structured, persistent memory of your work, people, and patterns automatically across every session, shared across native Mac app, iOS, web app, voice, email, Telegram, and Slack. Cowork operates as a working session: you describe a task, Claude executes it inside the session, and the next task starts fresh. There is no managed long-term memory of you across Cowork tasks.
Vellum connects to 50+ services through managed OAuth with one-click setup and no API keys to handle, including Google Workspace, Slack, Notion, GitHub, Linear, X, and Telegram. Cowork has native connectors for Google Drive, Gmail, Slack, DocuSign, FactSet, Linear, Jira, and Chrome, plus custom MCP support for the broader ecosystem.
Cowork is primarily a desktop product running inside the Claude desktop app on Mac and Windows, with mobile entry through the Claude app on iOS and Android. Vellum ships as a native Mac app, an iOS app, and a web app, with voice, email, Telegram, and Slack surfaces, all sharing the same memory.
With Vellum, your data lives on Vellum Cloud with per-customer isolation, encryption at rest, configurable retention, and custom LLM credentials so model API keys stay under your control. Vellum never has access to your data on any deployment path, whether you run the native Mac app on your machine or use Vellum Cloud. With Cowork, files Claude accesses stay on your machine inside an Apple VZVirtualMachine sandbox, and Anthropic processes actions through its infrastructure under its enterprise data policies.
Both target non-technical users. Vellum is built for every human, with a native Mac app, an iOS app, and a web app, plus voice, email, Telegram, and Slack, all syncing one persistent memory. Cowork is built for knowledge workers who want to hand off desktop tasks during a working session inside the Claude desktop app. For ongoing personal AI work across surfaces, Vellum is the broader fit. For self-contained desktop deliverables, Cowork is a strong execution layer.
Yes. Vellum runs as a native Mac app on your own machine, with iOS, web app, voice, email, Telegram, and Slack surfaces in sync. If you want continuous 24/7 background work without keeping your laptop open, Vellum Cloud handles it on the Pro plan from $50/mo with pay-as-you-go credits, configurable compute and storage, and your assistant's own email and subdomain. Either path gives you the same assistant and identity.
Yes. They serve different jobs. Some people use Vellum as their always-on personal assistant across surfaces and use Cowork when they want to hand a sandboxed desktop task to Claude for a single session. Most people consolidate on one over time once they see how Vellum's persistent memory and multi-surface presence cover the day-to-day.
Vellum's memory is structured, persistent, and assistant-managed: it builds up an understanding of you across every conversation, surface, and action, and that memory is the same whether you reach the assistant from Mac, iOS, web app, voice, email, Telegram, or Slack. Cowork's working session is task-scoped: you define a task, steer it through to completion, and the session ends. Future tasks start fresh, without inherited context.
