Browser Use, an innovative AI tool designed to make websites more accessible for agentic applications, has witnessed explosive growth in the past week, with daily downloads surging from around 5,000 to 28,000. This sudden surge in popularity can be attributed to the viral success of Manus, a Chinese startup's AI "agent" platform that leverages Browser Use to execute various tasks.

The connection between Manus and Browser Use became apparent when a post about Manus' use of Browser Use garnered over 2.4 million views and hundreds of reshares on X. As a result, Browser Use's downloads and usage numbers skyrocketed, with co-creator Gregor Zunic stating that the past few days have been "really wild" for the company.

Zunic, along with Magnus Müller, launched Browser Use last year out of ETH Zurich's Student Project House accelerator. The duo envisioned web agents – autonomous agents that navigate websites and web apps – as the "big thing" in 2025. What started as casual brainstorming turned into a challenge, and they built a minimum viable product (MVP) in just four days. The rest, as they say, is history.

Browser Use's unique value proposition lies in its ability to extract a website's elements, such as buttons and widgets, allowing AI models to interact with them more easily. The tool can manage multiple browser tabs, set up actions like saving files and performing database operations, and handle mouse and keyboard inputs. A demo of Browser Use in action showcases its capabilities.

The company offers both managed plans and a free, self-hosted version of its software. It's the latter that has seen massive adoption in recent days. Zunic and Müller are positioning Browser Use as a foundation layer that will enable developers to build browser agents on top of it. Their ambitious goal is to have more agents on the web than humans by the end of the year.

While this may seem overly optimistic, several analysts predict that the broader market for AI agents will indeed experience enormous growth in the coming months. Research and Markets forecasts that the sector will reach $42 billion in 2029, while Deloitte anticipates that half of companies using AI will deploy AI agents by 2027. Browser Use's timing, it seems, has been fortuitous, and the company is well-positioned to capitalize on the growing demand for AI agents.

In conclusion, Browser Use's explosive growth is a testament to the growing interest in AI agents and their potential to transform the way we interact with the web. As the market continues to evolve, it will be fascinating to see how Browser Use and other players in the space adapt and innovate to meet the demands of this rapidly expanding sector.