Anthropic expands Claude’s capabilities with new app integration and research features

Anthropic, the AI startup behind the Claude chatbot, unveiled two major updates on Thursday aimed at expanding the utility and performance of its AI platform.

The new features, Integrations and Advanced Research, are designed to improve how users interact with Claude, making it easier to connect various apps and access in-depth research capabilities.

The Integrations feature allows developers to link external tools and services to Claude, enhancing its functionality. By tapping into the company’s MCP protocol, which supports the connection of business tools, content repositories, and app development environments, users can now seamlessly connect Claude to a variety of third-party apps. Early integrations include partners like Atlassian, Zapier, Cloudflare, Intercom, Square, and PayPal, each expanding Claude’s capabilities to perform tasks such as summarizing project data and automating workflows.

“With Integrations, Claude gains deep context about your work—understanding project histories, task statuses, and organizational knowledge—and can take actions across every surface,” stated Anthropic in a blog post. This feature is currently available in beta for subscribers to the Claude Max, Team, and Enterprise plans, with plans for broader availability to Pro users soon.

In addition to app integrations, Anthropic also introduced Advanced Research, an upgraded deep research tool that allows Claude to gather and analyze information from a wider array of sources. This feature enables Claude to conduct comprehensive research by crawling both internal and external data, including web content, enterprise accounts, and local drives connected through the MCP protocol. Users can expect more detailed reports within 5 to 45 minutes, with Claude providing clear citations for the sources used.

Advanced Research aims to compete with similar offerings from other chatbots, such as Google’s Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT. It uses a reasoning AI model to conduct deeper, more complex investigations into topics, unlike previous versions of the tool, which generated faster but shallower reports. According to Anthropic, Advanced Research now breaks down user requests into smaller parts, investigating each in detail before compiling a comprehensive report.

This update comes as Anthropic works to catch up with its competitors in the AI field, including Google and OpenAI, both of which have rolled out advanced features for their respective chatbots. While Anthropic’s annualized revenue stood at approximately $1.4 billion as of March, the company has set ambitious goals to reach $34.5 billion in revenue by 2027. With these new features, Anthropic is positioning itself to remain competitive in the rapidly evolving AI market.

Context and future outlook

The launch of these new features is part of Anthropic’s broader strategy to enhance Claude’s functionality and expand its user base. By integrating third-party apps and offering advanced research capabilities, the company aims to create a more versatile AI tool that can meet the needs of businesses and developers across various industries.

As the chatbot race intensifies, with deep research tools becoming a key differentiator, Anthropic’s efforts reflect the increasing demand for AI systems capable of sophisticated tasks, from business analytics to content generation. However, Anthropic still faces challenges in scaling its technology to meet its revenue targets, as it competes with tech giants like Google and Microsoft. The company’s ability to drive adoption of its new features will likely play a crucial role in its future growth.