AI agent vs. chatbot vs. automation
A chatbot answers within a single reply. Automation runs a fixed sequence of steps. An agent decides its own steps toward a goal, inside permissions a person sets. These are three genuinely different things, not marketing synonyms for the same product.
Chatbot / AI assistant
Can: Help a person think, draft, summarise, answer
Can't: Work unattended; complete a process
Automation
Can: Execute known steps reliably and cheaply at scale
Can't: Handle situations its designer did not anticipate
AI agent
Can: Pursue a goal across many steps in a changing environment
Can't: Exceed its permissions, knowledge, tools, or governance
Automation executes decisions that have already been made. An agent makes decisions inside boundaries you have set — that single sentence resolves most of the confusion in this space.