Whether you’re a solopreneur or run a business with dozens of employees, it never hurts to have extra help. AI assistants can help with your to-do list, handling routine tasks and automating busywork so you can recapture valuable time.
AI assistants use generative AI to interact with users in a conversational format. They let you directly ask a program for help, whether that’s with a search inquiry, rewriting an email, or filling out a spreadsheet.
“Having an AI assistant that can help you understand how to get set up and avoid common pitfalls [in business] and employ a strategy that works for you is massively helpful, especially when it comes to understanding results and tweaking strategies and experimenting,” says Alex Pilon, Shopify staff developer and AI advocate.
A 2025 study found a majority of businesses will increase AI investment this year. In this article, understand how an AI assistant could help you, discover the best tools currently available, and get tips on choosing the right AI assistant for your needs.
What is an AI assistant?
An AI assistant uses artificial intelligence (AI) to respond in text or voice to inquiries with a natural human style. It uses machine learning and natural language processing to understand requests so you can use a conversational tone when asking for help. If you use a smartphone, chances are it’s already equipped with an AI assistant: Siri or Google Assistant. AI assistants also power many apps and smart home devices.
In business, AI assistants are powerful timesavers, automating routine tasks and responding to layered questions. They’re equally capable of fielding both simple and complex requests, from “Help me write this email introduction” to “Analyze every email I’ve sent in the last three months and provide bulleted feedback on my communication style.”
How AI assistants can transform your business productivity
AI assistants can handle the time-consuming busywork for you, allowing you to focus your energy on growing your business. Generative AI tools improve a foundational metric for any successful business: productivity.
Here are several ways AI assistants can boost your productivity and transform how you work:
Streamline communication and information access
Think of an AI assistant as the next evolution of the search engine. Where a search engine provides you with a list of results, AI assistants directly answer your daily questions. Use it to answer complex math equations, research and analyze competitors, or improve a presentation.
Modern AI assistants can remember your conversations and build context around your use case to answer more complex inquiries. They can also help draft emails or summarize lengthy documents, making communication faster and more efficient.
Automate routine tasks and workflows
Repetitive tasks, like data entry, scheduling follow-ups, and form-filling, can take up valuable time and energy. Use AI assistants to automate these time-consuming processes. Tools focused on business automation can learn your most frequent actions and execute them across different applications. This frees up employees to focus on higher-value activities.
Enhance data analysis and decision making
An AI assistant can digest data relevant to your business and help you understand it. Use them to look for opportunities in your budget spreadsheet, analyze customer acquisition costs, and identify patterns or flaws in your sales and marketing funnels. They can provide quick summaries of key metrics and help identify trends that inform strategic decisions. Analytics tools powered by AI make sophisticated analysis accessible without needing advanced technical skills.
Boost content creation and marketing efforts
An AI writing assistant can be a big help with content marketing. Ask it for 20 examples of a snappy tagline for a new product, or use it to draft the script for your next TikTok. Treat the output as a brainstorming tool; consider it a rough first draft and edit from there to tailor it to your brand’s voice and tone. Email marketing services can integrate AI for drafting or optimizing campaigns while, according to Jeremiah Curvers, co-founder and CEO of Polysleep, leveraging AI can also simplify SEO.
"You don’t need to be an [SEO] expert, especially now with the advent of so many AI tools,” says Jeremiah. “It’s very easy to build a keyword list based on competitiveness. Look at what your competitors are doing and ensure that your onsite SEO is on point."
Improve meeting efficiency and note-taking
Repetitive tasks, like summarizing meetings and presentations, can take up valuable time and energy. Use your AI assistant to easily create executive summaries of meetings, articles, and email correspondence. Speaker-recognition features provide detailed breakdowns of audio conversations and allow integrations into your preferred note-taking app. AI meeting assistants can transcribe conversations in real time and automatically identify action items and key decisions.
Optimize scheduling and time management
Get a rundown of your day, schedule meetings and appointments, and send invitations and reminders—all by talking to an AI assistant. For example, if you’re deep in a budget spreadsheet when a colleague asks to adjust your scheduled meeting, you can use your AI assistant to move the meeting to the following day—without even looking up. AI-powered scheduling and time management apps can intelligently organize your calendar, automatically finding focus time and optimizing meeting slots for you and your team.
Choosing the right AI assistant for your business needs
Choosing your ideal AI assistant depends on your operational needs and goals. Considering a few key factors will help you find a tool that adds value and integrates with your workflow.
“Starting with AI for the first time, I would say interact with it as a ‘thought partner’—just ask it some questions about something, about anything you’re doing,” says Shopify’s Alex Pilon. “Take things with a grain of salt as you build your intuition for how it works and what its capabilities are. Keep asking questions and try to use it to expand on the boundaries of your own expertise."
Consider your business size and industry
The needs of a solopreneur differ significantly from those of a growing small business or a larger enterprise. General-purpose assistants might suffice for basic tasks in a small operation, while larger teams may need specialized tools with advanced features and integrations. Certain industries may also benefit from AI assistants tailored to their unique workflows, such as sales in a retail environment or project management in a service-based business.
Identify your primary use cases and workflows
What specific problems are you trying to solve? Are you spending too much time on email, scheduling meetings, analyzing data, or creating content? Identify the most time-consuming or inefficient tasks and prioritize tools that offer strong capabilities in the areas where you need the most support.
Evaluate features, integrations, and scalability
Look beyond the basic functionality. Ensure your AI assistant integrates with other tools, like your customer relationship management (CRM) software, calendar, or email client. Are there advanced features like sentiment analysis, custom automation building, or detailed analytics that would be beneficial? Consider if the tool can scale with your business as you grow, offering plans or features that support larger teams or increased usage.
Understand pricing models and ROI
Most AI assistants come with different pricing structures, including free tiers, per-user monthly fees, or custom enterprise plans. Evaluate the cost in relation to the potential time savings and efficiency gains. Calculate the potential return on investment (ROI) by estimating how much time or resources the AI assistant could realistically save your business.
Top AI assistants for businesses in 2025
Choosing the right AI assistant depends on your needs. Here are top picks, categorized to help you decide which type of assistant is the best fit for your business:
General-purpose AI assistants
These assistants offer broad capabilities across various tasks and are often integrated into operating systems or major productivity suites.
ChatGPT
ChatGPT uses OpenAI’s natural language processing to do a variety of AI-assisted tasks. Use it to write cold outreach emails, suggest video ideas, and organize your thoughts. Ask it to translate emails, learn the basics of a language, and understand slang and jargon. You can even use it to write basic code for your website.
Pricing: ChatGPT offers a free plan with basic access, a Plus plan for $20 per month with expanded features and usage, and a Pro plan for $200 per month designed for heavy users with higher limits and advanced capabilities.
Microsoft Copilot
Microsoft Copilot works best if you also use the Microsoft 365 suit. Even without the integration, it can help you draft copy, generate images, and analyze business data to find patterns in budget documents and customer behavior.
Pricing: Microsoft Copilot has a free tier, with Copilot Pro costing $20 per month. Business customers will pay different rates based on their existing usage of Microsoft services.
Google Assistant
Google Assistant is embedded into Android smartphones and Google smart home devices—all of which allow for a wide range of voice commands, like scheduling meetings, keeping a to-do list, or answering questions. Gemini, Google’s generative AI, now powers Google Assistant to improve your conversations. Its strength lies in hands-free operation and integration with the Google ecosystem.
Pricing: Free with any compatible Google device.
Siri
Siri is an AI tool built into Apple’s phones, wearables, computers, and smart home devices. It’s powered by a generative AI called Apple Intelligence that adds additional capabilities. In addition to common requests, it can respond to commands across different apps and is aware of your on-screen applications. For example, if you get an email about the new logo you’re working on, you can ask Siri to send a screenshot of your progress without leaving your editing app. Siri is ideal for users heavily invested in the Apple ecosystem.
Pricing: Free with any compatible Apple device.
Alexa
Alexa is a voice assistant embedded into Amazon smart home devices, such as speakers and displays. It can summarize calls, check warehouse inventory, or order office supplies. In February 2025, Amazon announced Alexa+, an upgraded Alexa that leans more into generative AI. Alexa is a good fit for businesses utilizing Amazon devices or services, offering voice-activated convenience.
Pricing: Free with any compatible Amazon device.
Specialized AI assistants
These tools are designed to address specific business needs and workflows, offering deeper functionality in their niche.
Shopify Magic (for ecommerce)
Shopify Magic is a built-in AI assistant for Shopify store owners. You can use it to remove or generate product image backgrounds for a uniform aesthetic. It also writes captivating product descriptions and FAQ sections, and can improve your email campaigns. The Sidekick tool answers your questions about using Shopify’s platform. Based on data from your store, Sidekick can provide tailored advice to guide you as you grow your business. Shopify Magic is specifically designed to help ecommerce entrepreneurs streamline tasks and grow their stores using AI.
Pricing: Free for Shopify store owners.
Otter.ai (for meetings)
Otter.ai is an AI assistant squarely focused on meetings. It provides transcripts, summaries, and action items. There’s also a chat feature that allows you to ask the assistant follow-up questions. It integrates with popular meeting platforms like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet.
Pricing: Otter.ai offers a free plan; a Pro plan, at $16.99 per user per month (monthly billing) or $8.33 per user per month (annual billing); a Business plan, at $30 per user per month (monthly billing) or $20 per user per month (annual billing); and a custom-priced Enterprise plan.
Clockwise (for scheduling)
Clockwise is built to intelligently manage your calendar. It works across teams to find open slots in your day, allowing you to conversationally adjust your schedule. It automatically optimizes your schedule to create the highest amount of uninterrupted focus time. It integrates with Google Calendar and Outlook Calendar.
Pricing: Clockwise offers a free plan; a Teams plan, at $6.75 per user per month (billed annually); a Business plan, at $11.50 per user per month (billed annually); and a custom-priced Enterprise plan.
Motion (for scheduling and task management)
Motion sets your daily schedule, using your calendar and to-do list to optimize your day. It automatically prioritizes your most important tasks and meetings and reschedules unfinished work.
Pricing: Motion offers an Individual plan at $34 per month (monthly billing) or $19 per month (annual billing); and a Team plan at $29 per user, per month (monthly billing) or $12 per user per month (annual billing), with bucket pricing for different team sizes.
Bardeen (for workflow automation)
Bardeen focuses on workflows, helping you automate repetitive tasks. Teach it to perform your most time-consuming busywork, from simple tasks like data entry and form-filling to more complex workflows like sales prospecting and market research.
Pricing: Bardeen offers pre-built automations called Playbooks and integrates with numerous apps. Bardeen offers a free plan; a Starter plan at $129 per month; a Teams plan at $500 per month (billed annually); and custom-priced Business and Enterprise tiers.
Jasper (for content creation)
Jasper is a marketing-focused AI assistant for content creation, allowing you to generate and rewrite copy, edit images, and incorporate SEO into your content. Key features include Brand Voice and Campaigns.
Pricing: Jasper offers a Creator plan at $39 per seat per month (monthly billing); a Pro plan at $59 per seat per month (monthly billing), which includes collaboration tools; and a custom-priced Business plan.
AI assistant for business FAQ
What is the best AI assistant for business?
The best AI assistant for your business depends on your needs. Major device-embedded AI assistants like Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant can handle the widest variety of routine tasks, like search inquiries and content ideation. More specialized assistants—like Clockwise, Otter.ai, and Bardeen—are a better fit for particular needs like scheduling, meeting summaries, and business automation. To find the best fit, identify your core needs, evaluate tool features and integrations, and consider the pricing and scalability for your business size.
How much does an AI assistant cost?
An AI assistant ranges in cost depending on your need and team size. Many AI assistants offer free plans for limited, personal use. Paid plans for specialized assistants like Motion cost up to $19 per user per month (billed annually), while other assistants like Jasper start at $39 per user per month (billed monthly). Custom enterprise plans are also available for larger organizations.
Is there a free AI assistant?
Free versions exist for several AI assistants, including ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Otter.ai, and Bardeen. Many device-embedded assistants like Siri, Google Assistant, and Alexa are also available at no additional cost.
