- Agentic AI is software that makes autonomous decisions to achieve goals with little human intervention.
- “Agentic AI” describes the capability, while “AI agents” are specific implementations of that capability.
- Agentic AI systems can exist beyond agents, such as embedded in frameworks or large-scale platforms.
- Customer support is a major use case, with agentic AI expected to handle 80% of service issues autonomously by 2029.
AI agents and AI chatbots aren’t just far-fetched buzzwords. They’re powering business processes worldwide – and they’re rapidly growing in popularity.
The real-world applications of AI agents range from the AI assistants on your devices to the customer support agent you interact with online.
Interested in the use cases of AI agents and chatbots? Let’s explore 25 of the ways organizations are employing AI technology today:
Customer-Facing Use Cases
Customer-facing AI agents are the most familiar type of applied AI agents. These agents engage directly with users, transforming customer experiences by providing fast, reliable, and personalized support.
Chances are, you’ve already interacted with one while shopping, troubleshooting, or browsing.
1. Customer Support
The most common of them all, customer support chatbots excel at handling high volumes of inquiries, offering instant responses to FAQs, troubleshooting issues, and guiding users to helpful resources.
By integrating with knowledge bases and ticketing systems, they streamline support processes, reduce wait times, and ensure customers feel heard – without overwhelming human agents.
2. Sales Assistance
AI agents can be deployed at any stage of an AI sales funnel. They enhance the sales journey by recommending products, comparing features, and providing real-time pricing or availability.
They help customers make informed decisions, boosting satisfaction and increasing conversion rates. Whether guiding a customer through a product catalog or upselling based on preferences, sales chatbots are becoming more common in digital experiences.
3. Lead Generation
A type of sales agent, lead gen bots aren’t usually pitched as sellers. They often provide valuable informationEngaging and qualifying leads is made simple with AI agents. They initiate conversations, ask targeted questions, and collect valuable details like email addresses or preferences.
Seamlessly syncing with CRM systems, they nurture prospects until they’re ready for human follow-up, ensuring sales teams keep their focus on high-quality leads.
4. E-commerce
From tracking orders to managing inventory inquiries, conversational AI for e-commerce is everywhere.
These agents provide tailored product recommendations based on browsing history or preferences, increasing the likelihood of a purchase. They also streamline post-purchase support, handle returns, and upsell complementary products.
5. Marketing and Outreach
AI agents for marketing are seeing more and more adoption on GTM teams as they embrace conversational marketing.
They can power personalized outreach campaigns by crafting tailored messages for different customer segments. These agents also identify opportunities to engage or re-engage customers, whether through promotional campaigns, follow-ups, or abandoned cart recovery.
Internal Business Use Cases
AI agents aren’t just for customers – they’re transforming internal operations, too.
By streamlining workflows and providing on-demand assistance, internal chatbots are starting to bring more efficient workflows to the workplace.
Here’s how they’re driving value behind the scenes:
6. Employee Support
HR chatbots are a go-to solution for answering questions about policies, PTO, and onboarding processes.
They provide employees with instant access to accurate information, eliminating the need to wait for HR support and ensuring smoother internal operations.
7. Knowledge Management
AI agents are used to improve access to company knowledge by retrieving documents, summarizing complex information, and delivering quick answers.
They assist with tasks like understanding compliance requirements or locating project resources, ensuring information is easily accessible across teams.
8. Training and Upskilling
AI agents enhance employee development by recommending tailored courses and resources based on individual roles or goals.
They provide instant access to learning materials, interactive quizzes, and simulations, offering flexible, on-demand support that keeps training efficient and engaging.
9. Process Automation
Too many companies keep their employees stuck on menial tasks.
But routine tasks like scheduling meetings, managing documents, or processing invoices become effortless with AI agents.
By automating repetitive operational workflows, they free up employees’ time for strategic, high-impact work, boosting productivity across the organization.
10. Research Assistants
AI agents streamline tasks like summarizing reports, identifying trends, and answering complex queries.
They process large volumes of data quickly, extract key insights, and present findings in a clear format, supporting decision-making across academic, corporate, and scientific fields.
11. Product Development
AI agents can enhance product development by analyzing customer feedback to uncover valuable insights.
They monitor market trends in real time, provide data-driven recommendations and automate routine tasks.
12. Data Analytics
Similarly, AI agents are also used to streamline data analytics, since they can automate repetitive tasks like data cleaning and report generation.
They consolidate information from multiple sources and deliver actionable insights to teams across departments – including identifying trends or tracking KPIs.
13. Custom Workflow Automation
For niche industries like biotech, energy, or construction, AI agents can build tailored workflows that address specific operational needs.
From automating laboratory data entry to optimizing energy distribution, they enable businesses to deploy customized solutions that improve efficiency and reduce costs in highly specialized environments.
14. Content Moderation
AI agents enhance content moderation by filtering user-generated content for compliance with company policies or legal guidelines.
They quickly detect inappropriate, harmful, or non-compliant material, ensuring safer online environments and protecting brand reputation.
Industry-Specific Use Cases
AI agents are transforming industries by addressing the specific challenges and needs of different sectors.
Whether in healthcare or travel, these systems optimize processes and improve user interactions through specialized, efficient solutions.
15. Healthcare
One of the industries quickest to adopt agentic AI is healthcare – a high-impact area to deploy new technologies.
AI agents are being used to assist with symptom checking, scheduling appointments, and explaining medical procedures in a user-friendly way.
Healthcare chatbots can streamline patient interactions, reduce administrative burdens, and provide accessible, accurate healthcare guidance.
16. Finance
From managing accounts to delivering personalized investment advice, AI agents for finance are transforming financial services.
They provide real-time fraud detection alerts, helping users stay secure and informed. By combining speed and accuracy, they elevate customer trust and operational efficiency.
17. Education
As virtual tutors, AI agents for students can provide learning support, answer academic questions, and deliver customized study plans.
AI chatbots for education make education more interactive and accessible, ensuring students and educators have the tools they need for success, both in classrooms and online.
18. Real Estate
The industry with the highest adoption rate of chatbots is real estate – and real estate chatbots are still increasing in popularity.
AI agents simplify real estate processes by recommending properties, managing client interactions, and automating document workflows. They enhance customer experiences by offering tailored property suggestions and streamline administrative tasks for human agents.
19. Travel and Hospitality
AI agents manage tasks like trip booking, itinerary planning, and organizing preferences such as room types or activities.
Hotel chatbots are increasingly used for reservations, amenity requests, and local recommendations, streamlining the travel experience with tailored, real-time support.
Read our case study on hotel chatbots for more ideas on how they can help guests and employees alike.
20. Legal Assistance
AI agents simplify legal workflows by summarizing lengthy contracts, highlighting key clauses, and flagging potential risks or compliance issues. They save time for legal teams by quickly analyzing large volumes of documents with precision, ensuring businesses stay compliant while reducing the likelihood of costly errors.
Advanced Use Cases
If you’re building on an extensible platform, you can develop an AI agent that completes any mulit-step workflow, across any use case.
Here are a few of the creative ways that bot builders are deploying their AI automation tools:
21. Event Management
Event planning involves a complex web of logistics, from managing vendors to keeping attendees informed. But AI agents simplify these processes.
These tools handle everything from coordinating schedules to sending reminders. They manage registrations, track attendee preferences, and even facilitate post-event feedback, ensuring nothing falls through the cracks.
22. Scientific Research
Research projects demand meticulous attention to detail and the ability to process massive datasets. AI agents are quickly becoming more common in research institutions.
These automation agents can analyze complex data, generate hypotheses, and automate time-consuming literature reviews.
By identifying patterns and summarizing findings, these tools enable researchers to focus on critical insights and innovation.
23. Crisis Management
Emergencies require quick decisions and accurate information, and AI agents excel at providing both.
By monitoring real-time data, AI tools are able to track developments, analyze risks, and deliver actionable insights. They help teams coordinate resources, plan effective responses, and maintain control in high-pressure situations.
24. Supply Chain Management
AI agents can predict demand trends, optimize inventory, and automate logistics workflows. Modern supply chains are complex, requiring accurate forecasting and seamless logistics to operate efficiently.
By analyzing real-time data, AI agents help prevent delays, reduce costs, and maintain smooth supply chain operations.
25. Cybersecurity
The growing threat of cyberattacks requires constant vigilance and fast, intelligent responses.
AI agents bolster cybersecurity by monitoring networks, identifying vulnerabilities, and detecting anomalies in real time. They use predictive analysis to respond to potential threats before they escalate, ensuring systems remain secure and operational.
Create a Custom AI Agent
AI agents and chatbots are reaching mass adoption rates across industries – from customer service, to internal operations, to e-commerce. The companies that are slow to adopt will feel the consequences of missing the AI wave.
Botpress is an endlessly extensible AI agent platform built for enterprises. Our stack allows developers to build LLM-powered agents with any capabilities you could need.
Our enhanced security suite ensures that customer data is always protected, and fully controlled by your development team.
Start building today. It's free.
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FAQs
1. What’s the difference between AI agents, chatbots, and virtual assistants?
Chatbots are usually rule-based and follow scripts, virtual assistants are more interactive (think Siri or Alexa), and AI agents go a step further. They can make decisions, trigger actions, and handle more complex workflows autonomously.
2. How do AI agents differ from traditional automation tools like RPA?
RPA is great for automating repetitive, rule-based tasks, but it’s not flexible. AI agents are smarter. They can understand natural language, adapt to changing inputs, and make contextual decisions in real time.
3. Are there industries where AI agents aren’t recommended?
In highly sensitive or tightly regulated industries (like defense or nuclear energy), AI agents might face limitations but even there, they can still be used for low-risk tasks like internal support or document retrieval.
4. What technical skills are needed to build and deploy an AI agent?
If you're using a no-code/low-code platform like Botpress, you mostly need logic and UX design sense. For custom setups, skills in JavaScript, APIs, and understanding LLMs go a long way.
5. How long does it typically take to go from concept to deployment?
It really depends on complexity, but for most use cases, you can have a functional AI agent live in a few days to a few weeks, sometimes even faster if you're using pre-built templates.
