The idea came on the train. Not at my desk, not in a quiet slot I had set aside for writing, but somewhere between two stations. I used to jot something like that into a note and hope it was still alive that evening. Now I pick up my phone, hand Claude the task, and by the time I get home there is a first draft waiting. Not on a server in the cloud, but on my own computer, the one sitting at home, switched on.
That is what Dispatch does. And the news here is the little word “too”. Dispatch had been around for a while in Claude Cowork, for knowledge work. What is new is that you can now start a Claude Code session the same way. You hand it a task from your phone, Claude works out what kind of work it is, and if it is development work it spins up a Claude Code session for it. You do not have to pick which one; Claude reads it from the task.
The nice part is what happens next. As soon as the Code session is running, it shows up in the Code tab of the mobile app. From there you can not only follow it, but step in yourself with Remote Control and keep working from your phone. So you start something blind, at a distance, and can take it over up close moments later. Starting and steering flow into one another, on a single screen in your hand.
What it actually is
Easiest to grasp through what came before it. Remote Control already existed: it lets you take over a session that is already running on your machine. You start something at your desk and pick it back up on your phone. The screen on your phone is then a window onto a session that keeps running locally.
Dispatch is something else. You are not taking over an existing session, you are starting a new task. You send a message and Claude conjures up the right environment on your side. Anthropic describes it as one continuous conversation you can hold from your phone or your desktop, keeping context. You ask something on the move in the morning, and carry on in the same thread at your desk that evening.
The two now complement each other. Dispatch is the starting point: you set a new Code session in motion. Remote Control is the follow-up: the session that appears, you take over through the Code tab on your phone to keep working on it. Before, that session had to be running already before you could take it over. Now you can start it from scratch, without your laptop ever being open.
One detail worth keeping in mind: the work runs on your computer, with your files, your connectors, and your project configuration. Not in some anonymous cloud environment. That also means your machine has to be awake and the Claude Desktop app open. A sleeping laptop does nothing.
Where it makes a difference for me
The gain is not laziness, it is timing. Good ideas rarely arrive at the moment you are ready for them. They turn up on the move, in a conversation, in the queue for coffee. The distance between “I think of something” and “I set it running” was always where ideas died. That distance is now a few taps on a screen.
A few things I use it for:
- Turning an idea straight into work. An outline for an article, a first structure, a rough version I finish later. It starts running while I am still on the move.
- Kicking off a fix. I notice on my phone in the evening that something is wrong with the site, and I can start the first analysis before I even open my laptop.
- Using dead time. Not as a compulsion, but because half an hour in a waiting room is suddenly enough to get something moving.
When the task is done, or when Claude needs your go-ahead, you get a notification on your phone. You see the outcome, not every intermediate step. For anyone running a lot of things at once, that is exactly the right amount of information.
The caveats
I want to be honest here, because this is not a feature without a shadow side. Three things I keep an eye on.
First, the dependency. It runs on your own machine, but it goes through Anthropic’s infrastructure and requires a Pro or Max plan. You build a way of working around a service you do not hold in your own hands. That is a trade-off, not an objection, but it deserves naming.
Second, the line between work and the rest. When work was still tied to a desk, there was a natural moment when it stopped. If you can start a task from anywhere, that line does not disappear on its own. You have to draw it yourself. The freedom to always be able to work is also the temptation to always be working.
Third, for anyone turning on computer use: do not let Claude loose on sensitive data or apps you do not trust. Anthropic calls it early itself and advises starting small. Good advice.
Dispatch does not change what Claude Code can do. It changes when and where you set it going. For me that is enough to stop losing the idea from the train.
How this article was made
Honest about the practice, since that fits this site: this article was itself made through the mobile app. I spoke the text in rather than typing it. After that it carried on in rounds from my phone, giving feedback, checking, polishing. And the publication and the social posts I scheduled right along with it, without my laptop ever opening. So the story above is one I tested while writing it.
Sources
- Put Claude to work on your computer — Anthropic, product announcement
- Assign tasks from anywhere in Claude Cowork — Claude Help Center
- Continue local sessions from any device with Remote Control — Claude Code Docs