Meta is making its move onto the desktop. The company’s Manus desktop app, born from its December 2025 acquisition of the AI agent startup Manus, launched in mid-March 2026 for both macOS and Windows, bringing a feature called “My Computer” that lets users manage files and automate tasks directly on their devices.
The timing is no accident. OpenAI announced plans around the same period for its own unified macOS desktop “super app” combining ChatGPT, Codex, and the Atlas browser into a single interface.
What Manus actually does
The core selling point of the Manus desktop app is its “My Computer” feature, which facilitates local file organization and app automation without routing everything through cloud services.
Meta acquired Manus in December 2025, and the desktop app arrived roughly three months later. The app works on macOS and Windows, giving it broader reach than OpenAI’s initial desktop efforts, which have historically leaned macOS-first.
The desktop AI land grab
OpenAI’s competing vision would merge three distinct products, ChatGPT for conversation, Codex for code, and Atlas for browsing, into a single macOS application. User feedback on OpenAI’s rollout has been mixed.
Meta AI has been accessible via web and mobile platforms for some time, with substantial updates to its desktop capabilities beginning around April 2025. The Manus acquisition accelerated what appears to have been an existing roadmap to move beyond browser-based interactions.
Why local AI matters
The distinction between cloud-dependent and locally-capable AI tools has real implications for adoption. Enterprise users have been cautious about sending sensitive documents and workflows through third-party servers. A tool that can automate file management and application tasks without that data ever leaving the machine removes one of the biggest objections IT departments raise.