Use Case
Research Automation Agents
Agents that search the web, summarize papers, extract data, and build knowledge bases.
researchweb searchsummarizationRAGknowledge
Top picks
Perplexity for Teams
Best for real-time web search with citations and shared research threads.
Elicit
Academic paper discovery and synthesis, especially useful for literature reviews.
NotebookLM
Transforms documents and links into podcasts, summaries, and study guides.
OpenClaw + Hermes Research skill
For privacy-first research, run local web search and summarize into an Obsidian vault.
How to choose
- Use Perplexity when speed and broad web coverage matter.
- Use Elicit for scientific paper analysis and hypothesis mapping.
- Use NotebookLM to turn your own documents into accessible briefings.
- Use a local stack when source material is sensitive or proprietary.
Common gotchas
- Verify citations; agents sometimes hallucinate paper titles or URLs.
- Keep research output in a linked note system so findings are traceable.
- Set scope limits so agents don’t spiral into unrelated topics.