Honest Manus AI reviews (2025): The truth about hype, pricing & limitations

You’ve probably seen the buzz around Manus AI. It’s been popping up all over Discord and X (formerly Twitter), pitched as a game-changing autonomous AI agent. The promise is pretty wild: a "general AI agent" that can handle complex, multi-step jobs completely on its own, without you needing to micromanage every step. It sounds like something pulled straight from a sci-fi movie.

But does it actually work as advertised? Once you get past the slick demos and influencer posts, what’s it really like to use? This review gets into the nitty-gritty, giving you a straight-up look at its features, how it performs in the real world according to user feedback, and some of the major drawbacks that might give you pause. We’ll figure out if it’s the future of AI or just another cool-looking tool that isn’t quite ready.

What is Manus AI?

Manus AI, created by the startup Butterfly Effect, isn’t just another chatbot. Tools like ChatGPT need you to keep feeding them prompts, but Manus AI is built to be an autonomous agent. You give it a goal, and it quietly works in the background to get it done. You can think of it as a "digital employee" that can browse the web, use different applications, and even run its own code to complete a task.

It works using a team of AI models, including big names like Anthropic’s Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Alibaba’s Qwen, to plan and carry out tasks. The whole idea is that it can manage a complicated workflow from beginning to end without you having to hold its hand.

<protip text="It’s easy to get these mixed up, but the AI agent at "manus.im" is totally different from Manus Meta ("manus-meta.com"). That other company makes high-tech data gloves for VR and robotics. They’re not related at all, so double-check you’re looking at the right one.">

Key features and what it promises to do

On paper, Manus AI has some features that are genuinely impressive. It’s easy to see why it got so much attention. It’s supposed to be a huge step up from the AI assistants we’re used to.

A truly hands-off agent

The biggest draw of Manus AI is its autonomy. You can give it a broad goal, like "plan a five-day trip to Edinburgh" or "find every two-bedroom apartment in Prague under my budget," and it’s meant to figure out the rest. It breaks the main goal into smaller steps, does the research, and gives you a completed result.

The whole process is asynchronous, which means you can assign a task, close your browser, and check back later to see the finished work. For anyone who spends hours on manual research or digging for data, that’s a pretty compelling idea.

"Manus’s Computer": A look behind the curtain

One of its neatest features is called "Manus’s Computer," an interface that lets you watch the AI work in real time. You can see its "screen" as it clicks through websites, fills in forms, and pulls information. This kind of transparency is a big deal because it gives you a glimpse into how the AI is "thinking."

It’s not just some black box that spits out an answer. You can see the steps it took to get there and even step in if you notice it’s going off track. It feels more like you’re collaborating with the AI instead of just barking orders at it.

A team of AIs for complex jobs

Under the hood, Manus AI uses a crew of specialized sub-agents rather than one single AI model trying to do everything. It has separate agents for planning, browsing the web, writing code, and more. The theory is that this approach lets it tackle more complex and unpredictable tasks than a standard Large Language Model (LLM) could. It’s what allows the system to come up with a plan, put it into action, and adjust as it goes.

The reality: Performance, bugs, and other headaches

While the promises are exciting, the actual experience reported by many users tells a different story. This is where the hype runs into some hard realities, and that initial excitement often turns into frustration.

Unstable systems and server overload

If you scan through Manus AI reviews, the most common complaint is about reliability. Users are constantly hitting the "Due to current high service load, tasks cannot be created" error message. The platform seems to buckle under the weight of its own popularity, making it tough to use, especially when lots of people are online.

This kind of instability is a dealbreaker for any serious business use. It might be fun to play around with, but you can’t depend on it for tasks that have a deadline. For professional work, you need a platform built for reliability. This is where a solution like eesel AI is a better fit, as it’s designed from the start to provide dependable, enterprise-ready automation for things like customer support.

Functional limits and frustrating bugs

Beyond the server problems, the tool is full of technical issues that get in the way. Users have shared a bunch of frustrating experiences:

• It hits walls (literally): Manus AI often gets stuck when it runs into paywalled articles or CAPTCHA security checks. This really limits its ability to do deep research, since a huge chunk of the web is inaccessible to it.

• It runs out of memory: Just when you feel like you’re getting somewhere on a project, you’ll likely hit a context length limit. This means you have to chop up your tasks into smaller, unnatural pieces, which kills your momentum and makes big projects a nightmare.

• It’s just plain buggy: The beta is filled with glitches. A common one is the tool creating empty ZIP files when you ask it to download code. Others have reported the agent getting stuck in loops, just refreshing a page over and over without doing anything useful.

A difficult user experience

Just trying to get started with Manus AI is another major hurdle. There’s a huge waitlist, and even when you get access, the beta program has a weird "one session per day" rule. If you miss a day, you lose that session. This makes it almost impossible to properly test the platform or use it for any real work.

This kind of gatekeeping feels pretty dated. Modern AI tools should be easy to access and try out. In comparison, platforms like eesel AI are completely self-serve. You can sign up, connect your helpdesk, and start building automations in a matter of minutes, no need to talk to a salesperson or wait for an invite code.

Use cases and pricing: Is it really worth it?

So, who is Manus AI actually for? Are there situations where it’s the right tool for the job, and does the price tag make sense for what you get?

Where Manus AI works (and where it doesn’t)

From what users have tested, Manus AI does its best work on simple, one-off research tasks that use the open web. It can do a decent job with things like finding an apartment, making lists of reporters, or gathering data that’s publicly available. If the information is free and doesn’t require a login or subscription, Manus has a decent shot.

But it struggles in a lot of other areas. It’s not the right tool for creative writing, sending nuanced emails, or any serious software development. Honestly, in many cases, you’d get a better and faster answer by using a specialized tool or just searching on Google yourself.

A closer look at Manus AI’s pricing

Transparency seems to be a problem when it comes to cost. The official pricing page on their website currently leads to a 404 error, which is a pretty big red flag for any company that wants your payment information.

However, some reviewers who got in have shared the pricing they were shown.

The pricing is based on a confusing credit system that gets used up by LLM tokens, virtual machine time, and calls to other APIs.

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This makes your final cost incredibly unpredictable. One complex task could wipe out your entire month’s credits in a single go, leaving you with a nasty surprise on your bill.

This is a world away from the straightforward approach of a platform like eesel AI. eesel has transparent and predictable pricing based on a set number of AI interactions per month. There are no hidden fees or weird credit systems, so you know exactly what your bill will be. You aren’t penalized with higher costs for being successful and handling more customer questions.

The verdict on its value

For most businesses, Manus AI just isn’t worth it right now. The mix of instability, limited access, buggy performance, and a murky, unpredictable pricing model makes it a risky bet. It’s an interesting preview of future technology, but it’s a long way from being a reliable tool you can build a workflow on.

The alternative to consider

The fundamental problem with Manus AI is that it’s a generalist. It’s a standalone agent trying to do a little bit of everything. It doesn’t have the stability, deep integrations, or fine-tuned control that businesses need to automate real, important work.

This is where eesel AI comes into the picture. It’s a specialized platform built for specific business workflows like customer service, IT support, and managing internal knowledge. It’s designed to solve the exact problems that tools like Manus AI create:

• Go live in minutes, not months: There are no waitlists or weird daily limits. eesel AI is a truly self-serve platform you can set up yourself in a few minutes.

• Deep integrations with your existing tools: Instead of just browsing the public web, eesel AI connects directly to the software you already rely on. It has one-click integrations for helpdesks like Zendesk, chat platforms like Slack, and knowledge bases such as Confluence to take meaningful actions right where your team works.

• Test with confidence: Before you let the AI talk to a single customer, you can use eesel AI’s simulation mode to see how it would have performed on thousands of your past tickets. This gives you an accurate forecast of its performance so you can roll out automation without any guesswork.

• You’re in control (with clear pricing): You get to decide exactly which types of questions the AI handles and which get passed to a human. And you pay a flat, predictable monthly price you can actually budget for.

A glimpse of the future, but not ready for today

Manus AI is a fascinating project. It offers a cool sneak peek into what a future with truly autonomous AI agents could look like. It’s easy to see the potential and get excited about what tools like this might be capable of one day.

But today, the reality is that it’s unstable, buggy, hard to get into, and has a confusing pricing model. That makes it a poor choice for any business that needs reliable, scalable, and affordable tools. It’s a neat experiment, but it’s not a professional solution.

While generalist agents like Manus AI are still figuring things out, businesses don’t have to wait to get the benefits of AI automation. Specialized, production-ready platforms are already here and delivering real value right now.

For teams that want to automate support, streamline their operations, and give their agents a tool that actually works, you can discover what you can build with eesel AI.