Manus AI

What Manus AI is

Manus AI is a general-purpose autonomous AI agent launched in March 2025 by Singapore-based Butterfly Effect Pte. Ltd. (founded by Xiao Hong). Branded 'Hands On AI' with the tagline 'Less structure, more intelligence,' it operates in a sandboxed cloud computer to plan, browse, code, and deliver complete work products including slides, full-stack web apps, research reports, and media. Its current model release is Manus 1.6 (December 2025). It is offered on a freemium credit-based pricing model with Pro and Team (per-seat) tiers, an OpenAI-compatible developer API at open.manus.ai, and desktop and mobile clients. After China's NDRC blocked Meta's proposed acquisition in April 2026, Manus announced in August 2026 that it would operate as an independent company.

Key features

• Autonomous general-purpose AI agent that plans and executes multi-step tasks
• Sandboxed cloud computer with internet access, persistent file system, and ability to install software
• Browser Operator for live web interaction and automation
• Wide Research: multi-agent parallel deep research across the web
• Full-stack web application development with auth, database, custom domains, and visual editing (introduced in Manus 1.5; current release is Manus 1.6)
• AI Slides, AI Design, AI image and AI music generators
• Collaboration sessions, shared Library, and Slack notifications

Where it lives

Sources & media

• Manus — official site (Hands On AI) · Manus (official)
• Manus 1.5 release notes (Manus-1.5 and Manus-1.5-Lite) · Manus Blog (official)
• Manus API overview (open.manus.ai) · Manus Developer Docs (official)
• Manus pricing and plans documentation · Manus Docs (official)
• Manus updates and changelog · Manus (official)
• Manus — Hands On AI (official product page)