A startup called Rabbit has unveiled an ambitious new gadget that uses AI to interact with apps and services on your behalf. The $199 Rabbit R1 looks like a mini handheld gaming device, with a small touchscreen and physical controls. But its software aims much higher than playing games.

Rabbit OS, the R1’s operating system, utilizes what the company calls a “Large Action Model” to essentially learn how apps work and then operate them for you. Tell the R1 you want to play a certain playlist on Spotify, for example, and the AI will open the app, navigate to that playlist, and start playback.

“We wanted to find a universal solution just like large language models,” said Rabbit CEO Jesse Lyu. “How can we find a universal solution to actually trigger our services, regardless of whether you’re a website or an app or whatever platform or desktop?“

Rather than create integrations with every app developer, Rabbit trained its AI by having humans interact with popular apps like Spotify and Uber. The model learned to recognize app interfaces and how to complete common tasks. An onboarding mode also lets users manually walk the R1 through app functions, which it then remembers for next time.

It’s an ambitious vision — one digital assistant to rule all your apps and services. And it’s not clear if the R1 has the power and polish to truly replace your smartphone. But by leveraging AI to understand and control third-party apps, Rabbit’s approach is a clever end-run around the walled gardens and fragmented landscape of modern software.

The Rabbit R1 is available for preorder now, priced at $199, with shipping expected in March. While it may not replace your iPhone anytime soon, it offers a compelling glimpse at how AI could one day liberate us from app overload.