Arlo vs Poke — which AI assistant is right for you?

You talk to both Poke and Arlo like a person, but they're built for different jobs. Poke, made by The Interaction Company, is a personal assistant that lives in your messaging apps and helps you run your own digital life. Arlo is an AI colleague for work. It runs in the channels your team already uses, takes real actions through tool access that's governed and approved, and logs everything it does.

Want a sharp, proactive assistant just for you? Poke is a strong consumer pick. Want something your whole team can lean on inside its existing workflows, with reviewer approvals and admin controls? That's the gap Arlo fills.

What Poke is (as of June 2026)

As of June 2026, Poke positions itself as a personal assistant you reach over the messaging apps you already have open. From its public materials:

• It works over Apple Messages (iMessage), WhatsApp, and Telegram, in both text and voice messages.
• It's aimed at individual consumers — the tagline is that it "fits into your life, not the other way around."
• It connects to apps like Gmail, calendars, Notion, GitHub, and Asana, and can act on its own.
• It ships "Poke Recipes" and a developer "Kitchen" for custom automations.
• Public pricing lists Free, Pro, and Ultra tiers, all built around one person's use.

What Poke does well is make AI feel as easy as texting a friend. Product details shift, so check Poke's own site for the current state before you decide.

What Arlo is

Arlo is one AI colleague for the workspace. There's no separate chat app to live in. It works inside the tools a team already uses: iMessage and SMS, Slack, Microsoft Teams, and live phone calls. It remembers context across conversations and sends a morning briefing of what changed overnight.

It connects to Slack, Gmail, Notion, Linear, GitHub, and 3,000+ other tools. For software with no API, it logs in once through a secure browser session and clicks, reads, and fills out forms the way a person would.

Governance is the part that sets it apart, and it's on by default. Every connection clears policy before each run. Drafts, sends, and writes wait on a reviewer you pick. Each tool call, source, and approval lands in a full audit trace you can go back and read.

Feature comparison

Capability	Poke (personal)	Arlo (work / teams)
Primary audience	Individual consumers	Teams and businesses
Messaging channels	iMessage, WhatsApp, Telegram	iMessage and SMS, Slack, Microsoft Teams
Live phone calls	Not a stated focus	Yes — inbound and outbound calls
Persistent memory	Yes	Yes, plus a morning briefing of changes
Integrations	Connects to popular apps	3,000+ tools
No-API tool access	Not a stated focus	Yes — secure browser sessions
Reviewer approvals	Not a stated focus	Yes — drafts/sends/writes await a reviewer
Audit trail	Not a stated focus	Full audit trace of calls, sources, approvals
Admin policy / roles / SSO	Not a stated focus	Yes, on the Business plan

This table reflects each product's stated positioning as of June 2026. "Not a stated focus" for Poke means its public materials emphasize personal use, not that the capability is impossible.

Which one is right for you

Pick Poke for yourself. One lightweight thread that handles your email, calendar, and errands, with no team controls to babysit.

Pick Arlo when the assistant acts for a team and the work carries stakes. Its reach across Slack and Microsoft Teams, its ability to make and take phone calls, and its governance model are all built for shared, accountable work. If you're choosing for work specifically, our guides on an AI assistant for founders and an AI assistant for sales go deeper.

On pricing, Arlo's Team plan is usage-based; the Business plan is custom and adds admin policy, roles, SSO, and audit export.

Governance is the real difference

A personal assistant optimizes for one user's convenience. An AI colleague has to hold up in front of teammates, customers, and auditors. That changes what the product has to do. Arlo treats every action as something that might need review: connections pass policy before each run, sensitive steps wait on an approver you name, and the audit trace records what happened and why. That's why you can point Arlo at real workflows and not just personal to-dos.

Still weighing options? Read our broader Poke alternatives overview and our explainer on the AI executive assistant category.

Try Arlo

If you need an AI colleague that works inside your team's tools with governed actions and a full audit trail, try Arlo.