# Agent Click

> **TL;DR.** Agent click refers to the capability of an AI agent to click, type, scroll, and read native desktop applications in the background without stealing the user’s cursor, window focus, or active Space.

- **Category:** AI / Developer Tools / Desktop Automation
- **Stage:** validating
- **Age:** 49 days
- **Origin date:** 2026-04-28
- **First detected:** 2026-04-29
- **Canonical URL:** https://earlyterms.com/term/agent-click
- **Sources:** 5 primary URLs

## Definition

Agent click refers to the capability of an AI agent to click, type, scroll, and read native desktop applications in the background without stealing the user’s cursor, window focus, or active Space. The term captures a new class of OS-level interaction primitives built specifically for LLM-driven automation.

The concept crystallized on April 28, 2026, when Cua (trycua) launched [Cua Driver](https://github.com/trycua/cua) on Hacker News, describing it as “a background computer-use driver for macOS that lets an agent click, type, scroll, and read native apps while your cursor, frontmost app, and Space stay where they are.” The driver uses Apple’s private SLEventPostToPid SkyLight API to route agent events directly to a target process.

## Analogy

Think of it as a second invisible hand that drives apps you’re not looking at.

## Why it's emerging now

LLMs can now reason about GUIs reliably enough to drive real apps — but every existing solution hijacks your cursor. Cua Driver’s April 28 Show HN launch introduced background agent-control as a first-class primitive, letting Claude Code, Codex, or any MCP-capable loop click native macOS apps while you keep working.

## Related terms

- *parent:* computer-use
- *related:* browser-use
- *related:* Browser Harness
- *related:* agent-harness
- *related:* Agent Harness
- *related:* managed-agents
- *parent:* agent-loop
- *related:* model-context-protocol
- *related:* agentic-coding
- *related:* coding-agents
- *related:* dev-agents
- *related:* claude-code

## Sources

1. [Show HN: Drive any macOS app in the background without stealing the cursor (165 pts)](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47936312)
2. [trycua/cua — Open-source infrastructure for Computer-Use Agents (15.1k stars)](https://github.com/trycua/cua)
3. [Inside macOS Window Internals — Cua Engineering Blog (Apr 23, 2026)](https://github.com/trycua/cua/blob/main/blog/inside-macos-window-internals.md)
4. [Cua Driver: comparison vs Codex Computer Use, Claude Cowork, Lume](https://cua.ai/docs/cua-driver/guide/getting-started/comparison)
5. [Cua — The Computer Use Agent Platform (official site)](https://cua.ai/)

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_Generated by EarlyTerms · https://earlyterms.com/term/agent-click_