An intent is what a user wants to accomplish. Detecting intent accurately is the first step in determining the right response, action, or workflow to trigger.
A user who says "I can't get into my account" has the intent of account recovery or troubleshooting. The same underlying need might be expressed in dozens of different ways: "locked out," "password not working," "can't log in," "access issue." Intent detection handles that variation so the system routes correctly regardless of how the request is phrased.
