If you’ve been keeping an eye on the rapid rise of AI tools this past year, you’ve likely heard the phrase 'AI agents' making the rounds. These are AI systems that perform actions on behalf of people. With this shift, a new concept is emerging alongside UX (user experience). It's called AX, or 'agent experience'.
As a UX-focused creative agency, our work is about human-oriented and intuitive experiences (so you can use an app, digital product or website with ease). But taking AX into consideration involves more than just a human focus. It involves humans working in partnership with AI agents that do tasks for them. This means the way businesses design, structure and deliver their digital products and services is about to shift once again.
What is an AI agent?
People can get confused between what a language model is and what an AI agent is. Let's take Chat GPT as an example. In its default state, ChatGPT is simply a language model. It can understand text, hold a conversation and generate answers, but it can't perform actions or tasks. It can’t click buttons, submit forms, update spreadsheets, or interact with your software. It behaves like a brilliant assistant who can think and speak, but has no ability to physically 'do' stuff. This is why, by itself, ChatGPT isn't an agent.
However, ChatGPT becomes an AI agent the moment it becomes connected to tools, integrations or workflows that allow it to perform actions on behalf of a user. When ChatGPT is given permission to create documents, update data, run tasks, deploy code, send emails, automate workflows or interact with software, it moves from simply generating text to actually taking action. This ability to perceive a situation, make decisions, and carry out steps in a digital environment is what defines an agent. So ChatGPT can be both: a conversational model when used alone, and an AI agent when it’s equipped with 'hands' that let it operate human tasks. This distinction is important because the rise of agent-capable systems is exactly why Agent Experience (AX) is becoming essential.
What is AX (agent experience)?
AX refers to the way digital products are designed so that AI agents can easily understand them, navigate them and take actions within them. If UX focuses on the human experience, AX is all about making sure AI agents can operate effectively.
Agents need clarity. They need predictable flows, well-structured content and information that makes sense to both humans and machines. They rely on clear instructions, readable documentation, and systems that are consistent so they know what to do next. When digital products are 'agent-friendly,' AI agents can read them, understand them and complete tasks through them. When they’re not, both the human user and the agent become stuck.
Why is AX emerging now?
AX is becoming important because AI agents are quickly turning into the new starting point for how people accomplish things online. In the early days of the internet, having a website was all you needed to look legitimate as a business. Later, if you didn’t appear in Google search results, you were effectively invisible. We're now entering an age where users rely on AI agents to navigate the internet, gather information and perform tasks for them. Instead of manually filling out forms, clicking through menus or digging through content, people will increasingly hand these jobs over to AI agents.
This means that if a business’s digital experience isn’t built in a way that AI agents can understand or use, those agents will overlook it. If an agent can’t navigate your platform or website, your human audience may never see or use your product. This shift is happening quickly, and businesses that plan for it now will have the upper hand.
How AX fits into UX
AX doesn’t replace UX. Rather, it expands or adds onto it. UX will always matter because humans still have final control and decision-making power when they interact with apps and digital products. But when users delegate tasks to agents, every step the agent takes reflects on the experience the user has. If an agent can’t understand or complete an action within your product, the user is the one who feels the friction.
You can think of AX as a new kind of user persona – not human, but just as important. Humans, developers and agents are all interacting with your product in different ways. When they're all supported, the experience becomes smoother.
Examples of AX in action
AX might sound theoretical, but it’s already innovating many sectors. For instance, Clerk, an authentication platform, is designing authentication flows so that AI agents can securely sign in or manage access on behalf of users. In future, agents will need to log into applications, manage user accounts and interact with sensitive information securely.
Neon, a modern serverless database company, is refining its product so AI agents can efficiently manage, query and organise data. The company is preparing for a world where agents build and operate applications alongside humans, and databases need to be agent-compatible.
What AX means for your business (even if you’re not technical)
If you’re a business owner, you may wonder how AX applies to you. The answer is that the way customers interact with your digital presence (like your website, your product, your platform etc), will increasingly involve AI agents helping them. Whether it’s assisting with form-filling, scanning your site for useful information, comparing your product to others, or taking actions inside your platform, AI agents will act on behalf of human users.
When an agent understands your website, everything feels easier and more seamless for users. When it doesn't, users will feel that friction and may drift elsewhere. This is the same pattern we saw with mobile responsiveness, UX and SEO. At first, they were optional – now they're essential. AX is following the same trajectory.
A great AX experience starts with clarity. Your website, app or digital product should be well-structured, with clear content and predictable paths that are easy for agents and humans to interpret. It also requires documentation and information that can be read by both machines and humans. Systems should behave consistently so agents can make decisions reliably, and tasks within your digital experience should be simple enough for an agent to perform without confusion. When products are designed this way, both agents and humans benefit because actions happen quickly, smoothly, and with fewer errors.
Looking to the future
We’re moving towards a world where many applications will be created with the help of AI, and where tasks that once required manual work will be handled automatically by AI agents. As more people adopt these tools, they'll expect products they use to work seamlessly with their agents.
Just as UX made products more human-focused and SEO made websites quicker and easier to find, AX will shape how agents interact with your brand. The businesses that embrace this shift early will gain the advantage. As a UX and creative agency, we believe AX isn’t just a trend, but the next move in digital design.
