ChatGPT Task allows you to schedule tasks or reminders in advance. A first step towards agentic artificial intelligence.
What if ChatGPT became your autonomous personal assistant? In any case, this is OpenAI’s long-term vision. If the firm has still not deployed autonomous agents capable of acting on your behalf, its latest functionality is taking the path. Named Task, the latter allows you to create and modify events or task lists. The goal? Automate part of your routines with ChatGPT.
How does Task work?
The Task functionality is available in beta for Plus, Team and Pro users, including in France and Europe. The principle is simple: the tool allows you to create reminders or tasks, recurring or not. These tasks can contain, that’s the whole point, personalized instructions that ChatGPT (precisely GPT-4o) will have to carry out in due time. Once the task has been completed by the model, a notification is sent to the user on the mobile or web application or on the Mac app.
For now, Task remains in beta for an indefinite period. OpenAI will then deploy the feature in general availability a second time, after obtaining sufficient feedback. The beta limits the number of tasks programmable in advance to 10. In the first days of launch, several scheduled tasks refused to run as noted by many users including the JDN. OpenAI claims for its part that this is a temporary server bug linked to too much demand.
How to create tasks with Task?
Creating a reminder or task is very simple. Simply select the “4o with scheduled tasks” template from ChatGPT’s template selection menu.
Finally, a simple prompt in natural language allows you to program a reminder or a task, recurring or not. Example: “Remind me to do my news monitoring every day at 8:00 a.m.” The model then understands that it must create a task and configures it for you automatically. It is then possible to modify the task to refine its name, the instructions or its schedule or even its activation.
We recommend that you modify the “Instructions” field. In fact, the instructions generated by default often randomly transcribe your intentions. Furthermore, as these are generated only in English, for the moment, the reminder or the result of your task will necessarily be in English. It is then appropriate to translate the instructions into French or to specify in the prompt that the expected result must be in French.
The instructions for a task should be very simple. Currently, not all ChatGPT tools are available with Task. Only web search and image generation with Dall-E are supported. So no more reasoning with o1, the execution of Python code, the use of Canvas mode, the use of files or even the use of an assistant (and therefore potentially an external API).
-Finally, OpenAI makes it possible to find all the tasks created from the address chatgpt.com/tasks. It is possible from the interface to modify, delete or temporarily deactivate one of the scheduled tasks.
3 examples of prompts for ChatGPT Task
For the moment, the use of ChatGPT Task is still very limited. As soon as OpenAI implements connectors with third-party APIs, the possibilities will quickly become interesting. It could be possible to sort an email box automatically, send text messages, connect AI to your drive to create documents and many other things.
In the meantime, web search already makes it possible to automate some of the routines. For example, it is possible to create a news monitoring routine every day at 8 a.m. on your theme with the following prompt, to be added in the instructions:
"Réalisez une synthèse des dernières 24 heures sur [SUJET] incluant les informations majeures classées par ordre d'importance avec analyse d'impact, les sources et dates de publication, et une conclusion sur les points essentiels à retenir. Le style doit être clair, factuel et objectif. "
Another use case is that it is possible to produce a weekly report on the new regulatory constraints in your sector. Prompt, to add in instructions:
"Fais-moi une synthèse des principales réglementations publiées ces 7 derniers jours au Journal Officiel et sur les sites des autorités de régulation pour le secteur [nom du secteur]. Identifie uniquement les changements majeurs et leurs implications pratiques en termes simples."
Finally, in a more traditional way, it is possible to program reminders, like an ordinary assistant such as Alexa or Google Home. For example, being reminded to validate your employees’ expense reports before the end of the deadline. Prompt:
"Crée un rappel mensuel récurrent pour la validation des notes de frais, programmé par défaut le 14 de chaque mois à 9 heures, avec pour objet 'URGENT : Validation des notes de frais à effectuer' et comme message 'Action requise : valider les notes de frais de l'équipe dans l'outil XXX - Délai de traitement impératif pour le versement des remboursements'."
Task is actually a first step towards the completely autonomous agent at your service that OpenAI wishes to develop. With connectors and access to reasoning with o1, the possibilities would be multiplied. These capabilities could materialize relatively quickly with the planned arrival of Operator at the start of the year, an autonomous agent integrated into ChatGPT, initially planned for January according to Bloomberg.
