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Adobe is fully embracing chatbots and artificial intelligence agents to serve as design assistants and automate creative workflows. At the Adobe Max conference in Miami, Florida, the company previewed new features allowing third-party AI agents to access Creative Cloud projects, enhanced capabilities for the Firefly AI Assistant, and background tools for recurring tasks.
Third-Party AI Integration and Local MCP
Adobe previewed local Model Context Protocol (MCP) integrations for Creative Cloud tools, offering users a choice between Adobe’s assistants and daily third-party tools. These integrations allow external agents from companies like OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic to operate locally inside Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, and After Effects, making direct edits to native project files.
Users can manually take over and refine work at any point because all project layers, vectors, bins, and sequences remain fully editable. Connected agents can also incorporate other MCP-capable tools into a single workflow, such as pulling reference files from Google Docs, designing a project in Adobe software, and sharing the outcome via Slack. Adobe stated that a private beta for Creative Cloud local MCP integrations will launch in early 2027.
Always-On Agents and Firefly AI Assistant Upgrades
The company also previewed “always-on” agents designed to perform continuous, recurring background tasks so users can focus elsewhere or step away. Users can assign jobs like organizing incoming assets, conducting ongoing quality checks, or preparing content, and then review the agent’s plan and final results. For instance, an agent could automatically convert incoming pictures into promotional graphics for various social media channels for daily review. Adobe has not provided a launch date for this preview, but noted it will arrive in the Firefly AI Assistant first.
Meanwhile, the Firefly AI Assistant beta is receiving several upgrades powered by Adobe’s creative agent. New features include a Plan Mode for reviewing, editing, and approving task plans, a Model Selector to choose specific AI models or rely on auto-select, and an integration with Firefly Boards. The assistant also allows users to set preferred formats, colors, brand guidelines, characters, and products to apply automatically across all projects.
Expansion into Video Editing
The creative agent, which has been integrated into Premiere, Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, After Effects, and Frame.io since its introduction earlier this year, is expanding further into video editing. In Premiere, the agent can now track masked subjects across a frame, apply effects, and adjust color and exposure across entire clip sequences. It is also coming to the Premiere mobile editing app to support conversational video edits on the go.
Adobe’s broader strategy aligns with statements made in April by creativity head David Wadhwani, who outlined that the Adobe creative agent will eventually appear in virtually everything the company develops. Whether building proprietary agentic solutions or welcoming third-party bots, AI agents will remain central to Adobe’s future product development.
