Dispatch and Mobile Control
Control your entire Co-Work environment from your phone — and know exactly when to use Dispatch versus simpler alternatives.
What you'll learn
What Dispatch Is — and Is Not
Dispatch is a persistent cross-device conversation thread. One continuous conversation that exists simultaneously on your desktop Co-Work app and your mobile Claude app. What you type on your phone arrives on your desktop. What Co-Work produces on your desktop is readable on your phone. It auto-routes requests: code tasks go to Claude Code, automation tasks go to Co-Work.
Dispatch does not give you a view of your desktop screen on your phone. You cannot see what's running on your Mac. You cannot control your Mac's interface from your phone via Dispatch. Dispatch is a conversation thread — think of it as a single WhatsApp thread that spans your devices and routes to Co-Work on one end.
Dispatch is available on Pro and Max plans only. It is not available on Free or Team plans. Verify your plan includes Dispatch before attempting setup.
The Decision Framework: When to Use Dispatch
Not every mobile interaction with Co-Work needs Dispatch. The decision comes down to one question: does this task require human input at any point during execution?
- Use Dispatch when: Co-Work needs to pause and ask you something mid-task. When you need to approve a draft before it proceeds. When the task involves judgment calls that require your input. When you want to interact with an in-progress workflow from your phone.
- Use simpler alternatives when: The task is fully scripted and needs no mid-execution input. A quick "what's on my calendar tomorrow?" doesn't need Dispatch's full architecture — the mobile Claude app handles it directly.
Paul (Advanced Use Cases) references an iMessage extension for Claude that enables fire-and-forget task delegation via iMessage. Verify current availability in Claude app settings — this may be a newer feature or may require separate configuration. The underlying capability (sending tasks to Co-Work from iMessage) depends on app version and availability may change.
Setting Up Dispatch
Setup is a two-step pairing process:
- Enable on desktop: Co-Work Settings → Dispatch → Enable. Note the pairing code that appears.
- Pair mobile: Open the Claude app on your phone → Settings → Connect to Dispatch → enter pairing code → confirm the connection.
Paul's tip from his Advanced Use Cases content: "Ask Co-Work to walk you through Dispatch setup." Open a Co-Work session on desktop and say "Help me set up Dispatch." Co-Work will guide you through each step with prompts appropriate to your current settings state — useful if the UI has changed since any specific instructions were written.
The most reliable way to set up Dispatch is to ask Co-Work to walk you through it. Say "Help me set up Dispatch" in your desktop session. Co-Work knows the current app state and will give you context-appropriate guidance — more reliable than following static written instructions as the app updates.
Approval Flows via Dispatch
The most valuable Dispatch pattern is the approval flow: a task runs on desktop, Co-Work generates a draft or reaches a decision point, pauses, and sends you the draft on mobile. You review on your phone and respond with approval or feedback. Co-Work continues with your decision.
A concrete example Brooke Wright describes:
Mobile prompt: "Look at the last 5 Google Reviews for my
business and draft replies. Send me the drafts before posting
anything. Wait for my approval on each one."What happens: Co-Work reads the reviews, drafts replies, sends them to you via Dispatch thread on your phone. You read each draft. Reply "approve" or "revise the second one — make it warmer." Co-Work adjusts and proceeds only with your approval on each. The reviews get replies only when you've signed off, even though Co-Work did all the drafting.
Dispatch + Computer Use: Phone-to-Desktop App Control
When Dispatch and Computer Use are both configured, you can control native desktop applications from your phone. The flow: you send a task via Dispatch on mobile → Co-Work receives the task on desktop → Computer Use executes the task in native apps on your Mac → result appears in the Dispatch thread on your phone.
Paul's shopping example from Advanced Use Cases: from your phone, ask Co-Work to research a product, find the best price across three retailers, and add it to your cart for your review before checkout. Co-Work uses Computer Use to control the browser, does the research and comparison, adds to cart, then pauses for your purchase approval before completing the checkout. You never touched the desktop.
Computer Use is covered in full in Module 13, including the safety model, required permissions, and per-app blocklist configuration. The Dispatch + Computer Use combination assumes you have those safety measures in place first.
Tier B Capstone: What You Have Built
This is Morgan's transformation target — the completion of Tier B. Look at what you've assembled across Modules 3–12.
This is a functional AI operating system. Every component works. Every component is connected. This is what Morgan's transformation looks like.
Where Tier B Ends and Tier C Begins
Tier B is about building a complete, reliable, personal Co-Work OS. Everything in Modules 7–12 makes that OS more robust, more automated, and more accessible from anywhere.
Tier C is about pushing the boundaries of what Co-Work can do: Computer Use for native app control, advanced skill composition with orchestrators, sub-agents for parallel execution, safety and compliance architecture, enterprise monitoring and deployment. These are the capabilities that transform individual practitioners into AI-native operators — people who can design, deploy, and manage AI workforce systems for themselves and their organizations.
If Morgan is your destination, you're done. The OS is built. If Sam is your destination, Module 13 starts tomorrow.
Set Up Dispatch and Delegate Your First Mobile Task
Step 1: Enable Dispatch on desktop. Navigate to Settings → Dispatch → Enable. Note the pairing code. Alternatively: say "Help me set up Dispatch" and let Co-Work guide you through the current setup flow.
Step 2: Pair your phone. Open the Claude app on your mobile device. Go to Settings → Connect to Dispatch → enter the pairing code from your desktop. Confirm the connection is active.
Step 3: Test a simple query from mobile. From your phone, send: "What is on my calendar tomorrow?" Verify the response comes through Dispatch — and that Co-Work uses your Calendar connector to answer from real data.
Step 4: Test an approval flow. From your phone, send: "Look at my last 3 emails and give me a one-paragraph summary of each one. Send me the summaries before doing anything else." Verify Co-Work pauses after summarizing and waits for your response before proceeding.
Step 5: Document one recurring Dispatch use case. Write down one task you'll delegate via Dispatch regularly. This becomes your reference for the approval flow pattern — a task that runs on your desktop while you're away from it, pausing for your mobile approval at the right moment.
Success criteria: Dispatch paired and confirmed working on both devices. One approval flow tested and working. One recurring Dispatch delegation scenario documented.