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Head to head · Assistants reached by message · October 2026 research run

Poke vs szn

Poke scores 37.6 (F) on agent readiness against szn's 7.3 (F), and leads in every scored category. Both do assistants reached by message.

Best AI personal assistants that act for one person · All 834 assistants comparisons

PokeThe Interaction Company of California Inc. · Platform F37.6/100#960 of 1010 sznNomadic Futures · Platform F7.3/100#1010 of 1010

Which one, for what

Poke F

Best for One person who wants an assistant in their text messages that reads and drafts mail, manages a calendar and reaches other apps through MCP.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 51 against 5
  • Schema & documentation, 42 against 10
  • Agent ergonomics, 30 against 0
  • Security & auth, 24 against 0
  • Payments & pricing, 30 against 20
  • Maintenance & community, 31 against 2
  • Transparency & trust, 58 against 23

Watch for

No documented setting for which actions need approval before Poke sends, deletes or spends. Release notes mention email draft approval only in passing

szn F

Best for A person who wants calls, emails and bookings done for them and has an access code.

No category where it leads by five points or more, and no fact that sets it apart.

Watch for

Early access by access code only.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runPokesznEdge
Reliability16%20515Poke +46
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.24210Poke +32
Agent ergonomics13%16.2300Poke +30
Security & auth14%17.5240Poke +24
Payments & pricing10%12.53020Poke +10
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.8312Poke +29
Transparency & trust7%8.85823Poke +35
Negative events≤1500
TotalF 37.6/100F 7.3/100

Facts side by side

FactPokeszn
KindPlatformPlatform
VendorThe Interaction Company of California Inc.Nomadic Futures
Hosted endpointno (local only)no (local only)
TransportsHTTP
AuthAPI keyOAuth or key
PricingFreemiumFree
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under Poke's Terms of Service. The poke npm package (CLI and Node.js SDK) declares MITClosed service. No terms of service were found on theszn.ai. A privacy policy and an acceptable use policy (both last updated March 2026) apply.
Read-only variant documentednoyes
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-06-25none
Terms last updated2026-03-17no document linked
Privacy policy last updated2026-09-11
Customer content may train modelsyes
Terms restrict automated accessyes
Terms restrict benchmarkingyes
Terms or service can change without noticeyes
Arbitration or class-action waiveryes

Verdicts

Poke

Hosted assistant that answers in Apple Messages, WhatsApp, Telegram and RCS and acts in Gmail, Outlook, calendars and MCP servers. Plan prices and a status page are public. No approval settings, credential storage, model providers or retention periods are documented, and customer content trains models unless Maximum Privacy is selected.

szn

szn is an errand assistant in early access that makes calls, sends emails and books for its owner, free during the preview for people with an access code. No outside agent can call it, no terms of service or legal entity appear in its policies, and its privacy policy says nothing on training.

Before you call either

Poke

  1. POST JSON to https://poke.com/api/v1/inbound/api-message with a Bearer key from Kitchen. Legacy pk_ keys work only on the deprecated /api/v1/inbound-sms/webhook
  2. Expect only {"success": true} back. Poke's answer goes to the owner's message thread, not to the caller
  3. Do not retry a POST blindly. No idempotency key is documented, and a repeated message may make Poke act twice
  4. Treat an API key as full access to the owner's mail, calendar and integrations. Create one key per automation and revoke it when done
  5. Avoid the prefilled integration link with apiKey in the query string for real secrets. Enter the key in the form or use npx poke@latest mcp add -k

szn

  1. Don't plan to call szn from another agent. It answers only its web app, iMessage, SMS and email for the owner.
  2. Tell the owner they need an access code to start, and that the acceptable use policy makes them responsible for confirming actions.

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Poke or szn?

Poke scores 37.6 (F) on agent readiness against szn's 7.3 (F), and leads in every scored category.

Other comparisons with Poke or szn

Disclosure

szn competes with LocalGhost, which Anchor Terminal's founder builds. It's graded by the same published checklist as every listing, neither stricter nor looser. Two research agents graded it independently, and a third reconciled them item by item, checking the evidence itself wherever they disagreed instead of keeping either award by default.

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