Your files stay put: Perplexity’s hybrid AI keeps confidential data off the cloud

Perplexity has launched hybrid compute for its Computer agentic platform, allowing AI agents to divide workloads between cloud-based frontier models and local open-weight models on Apple silicon Macs. This system dynamically routes sensitive data to the local device to ensure confidentiality without losing task context. The feature is available via the Perplexity desktop app for Pro, Max, and opting-in enterprise customers, marking the first time an agent can hand off confidential task portions to local hardware.