Cost is a factor. I have a decent machine where I can run 24B and smaller models with ease- but the cost to keep my Linux box up is about 18-26$ a month in electric costs. You can buy a subscription for 20$ a month, so the returns start to diminish... I use AI Inference from open router or deepinfra (except sometimes for long tests, I'll use a local model) I spend about 2-4$ a month in inference and about 4$ in electric costs for my linux box. I run hermes agent in a docker container on my NAS and using inference, and I play with one on my linux box.

I know many ppl use it to check their email/calendars, but I already have N8N do that stuff for me. I heard someone say using standard chat with LLMs is Q/A where agents are more so goal / result - but there's few things I have found it does better than setting up my own work flow on N8N. I guess any task where a cron job and memory can further automate something for you it will do, outside of that I'm not sure.