Home / Cowork, the digital colleague
Cowork everywhere, who can do what, and the trail left behind
Cowork moved from desktop only to web and mobile on 7 July 2026 and remains in beta on these two surfaces, with cloud sessions that keep running with no device switched on at all; on an Enterprise account, custom roles bound access team by team, and Cowork's activity turns up in a technical export, not in the chat transcript itself, except for a session running locally on the machine, whose history stays only on that computer.
Cowork was born on the desktop, an application on the machine opened and connected to reach the files and applications on the computer. It now also runs in the browser and on mobile, in a remote session on Anthropic's servers: a session launched in the cloud keeps running even once the computer that started it is switched off, and a scheduled task runs with no device switched on at the set time.
A recent extension, still in beta
Cowork on the web and on mobile remains marked beta by Anthropic, with functions that are not yet all available there. Access depends on the plan: on Pro, Max and Team accounts it opens by default, while on an Enterprise account an administrator must switch it on first. The figure accompanying this lesson traces the main stages of this extension, from desktop only up to the situation verified when this was written.
Who can switch on what, depending on the plan
On a Team account, access to Cowork stays a single toggle for the whole organisation: it opens or closes the tool for everyone at once. On an Enterprise account, an administrator has an extra tool, groups and custom roles that open Cowork team by team rather than for the whole organisation in one go. On an Enterprise account, cloud sessions are themselves switched off by default, and an administrator must open them before a task can keep running with no device switched on. Before starting a task that touches sensitive data, it is worth knowing which of these two logics governs your organisation. The approval level, by contrast, remains a setting each person chooses for their own tasks, whatever their organisation's plan.
Team : un interrupteur, pour toute l'organisation.
Enterprise : des groupes et des roles, equipe par equipe.The trail left behind, two separate channels
What Cowork has done does not turn up in the chat transcript itself. On Team and Enterprise plans, a technical export exists, provided an administrator has set up a collector to receive it; by default it carries only metadata, the content of the prompts sent and the replies only enters it if an additional setting switches that on, alongside the tools used and the errors encountered. On an Enterprise account, a second channel is added to this: a compliance interface allows Cowork activity on desktop, web and mobile to be retrieved on demand. Neither of these two channels covers a session running locally on a machine: its history stays stored on that computer, outside Anthropic's standard retention rules, with no centralised deletion point for an administrator.
Cowork's move from desktop only to web and mobile
An administrator of an organisation on the Team plan checks Cowork's settings to restrict its access to the support team alone, before opening the tool to the rest of the organisation. She finds a single toggle, on or off, that applies to the whole organisation.
Write one sentence stating what this situation establishes, and one sentence stating what it does not establish.
What this establishes: This situation establishes that the Cowork access setting the administrator observed applies to the whole organisation at once, with no distinction by team.
What this does not establish: It does not establish that an Enterprise account would work the same way, since this organisation is on the Team plan and the situation describes no Enterprise account.
The three most common miscalibrations
- Trop large No organisation, whatever its plan, can ever restrict Cowork to a single team.
- Trop étroit This situation shows nothing about Cowork's access settings, since only one administrator was observed on a single occasion.
- À côté This situation shows that this organisation's support team has a greater need for confidentiality than the other teams.
- Cowork now also runs in the browser and on mobile, in a remote session on Anthropic's servers, and keeps running even once the computer that started it is switched off, except on an Enterprise account where this cloud session option stays switched off until an administrator opens it.
- The web and mobile versions remain in beta at Anthropic, open by default on Pro, Max and Team, and switchable on by an administrator on an Enterprise account.
- A Team account offers only a single toggle for the whole organisation, while an Enterprise account can open Cowork team by team thanks to groups and custom roles.
- A technical export exists for an administrator, but only if they have set up a collector, and by default it carries only metadata, without the prompts or the replies.
- A session running locally on a machine stays stored on that computer, outside both technical exports and with no centralised deletion point.
Open Cowork on the web or on mobile with your account, note whether access is open by default or whether a message states that an administrator must switch it on, then check on your desktop whether your local sessions are indeed the ones that stay only on that machine.
These points depend on an interface or a rule that may have changed since this was written. Check them on your own screen before relying on them.
- Check on your own account whether Cowork on web and mobile opens directly or whether a message states that an administrator must switch it on, this depends on your plan.
Every datable claim in this lesson links here to the public text behind it. A source that does not open proves nothing.
- Anthropic, Cowork available on web and mobile consultée le 2026-09-02
- Anthropic, using Claude Cowork on web, desktop and mobile consultée le 2026-09-02
- Anthropic, using Claude Cowork on Team and Enterprise plans consultée le 2026-09-02
- Anthropic, tracking Cowork activity through OpenTelemetry export consultée le 2026-09-02
- Anthropic, the Compliance API now covers Cowork and Claude Code consultée le 2026-09-02