Frame the question and what a good answer must contain, run a deep-research pass in the assistant you already have, log every claim against its source, and use a research agent when the work repeats or must end in a finished deliverable.
For anyone asking: How do I use AI for research I can trust?
Each one's way of doing it, and the point where it stops.
Agents use Web Search and Web Fetch, and a ready-made research agent handles recurring research with a source URL behind every fact. Results come as CSV, a spreadsheet, markdown or a dashboard. Scheduled triggers and a web-monitor trigger rerun the work, and Company Brain searches your own connected sources with citations. Where it stops: No free plan, only a one-time trial of Pro that needs a card. A trigger turns off after 3 failed runs in a row, and when credits run out agents stop and trigger runs fail.
Super Agent plans the steps, runs them on a cloud computer and returns a report, deck, spreadsheet or web page. Deep Research and Fact Check are separate named products, Search Web replies in AI Chat carry source links, and SecondBrain reads your connected apps on request. Where it stops: Super Agent cannot run scheduled jobs; recurring work belongs to Workflows. A job can run up to 2 hours, every run and retry uses credits, and AI Slides refuses pages behind a sign-in.
Manus researches the web in its own cloud browser. For many similar items, Wide Research gives each item its own sub-agent, runs 20 sub-tasks at a time and merges the results into a table, report or dataset. Output can be a report, PDF, slides or a dashboard, and a schedule can deliver recurring reports. Where it stops: Wide Research starts automatically and cannot be started manually. It is not on Free and is not meant for a single deep dive or fewer than 10 items. Manus cannot estimate a task's credit cost before it runs.
The official first-crew guide builds this exact job: a researcher agent with a search tool that writes a markdown report. You pick the search provider and the model, and CrewAI AMP can run the crew on a schedule. Where it stops: The framework needs Python skills. Search tools need their own provider keys and every agent step calls your own LLM provider key. On AMP, Basic allows 2 automations and 50 workflow executions a month.
You ask in Slack or chat, and Lindy combines your work context (emails, meetings, calendar) with web research for an ad hoc answer. Results can come back as Artifacts pages. Where it stops: Built for ad hoc questions asked in Slack or chat. Free is a 7-day start, not an ongoing plan.
Deep Researcher is one of four built-in Chat agents. For repeatable work you build a custom research agent with a Google Search step and page-reading steps, or start from a Marketplace template such as a competitor battlecard agent that sends weekly digests. Slide Builder turns findings into a deck. Where it stops: No free plan. Standard tools and agents stop after 15 minutes; a 24-hour tool type exists for long jobs. Failed runs and retries still count against the plan.
Every verdict rests on the data in our product reports, never on a fee. How we score →