# Agent Zero vs OpenMausBot

> OpenMausBot scores 65.4 (B) to Agent Zero's 54.6 (C) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openmausbot
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openmausbot.md (~3,700 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openmausbot.min.md (~680 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openmausbot.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-10-30

OpenMausBot scores 65.4 (B) on agent readiness against Agent Zero's 54.6 (C), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Agent Zero leads on payments & pricing. Both do agent harnesses.

- Agent Zero: grade C, 54.6/100, rank #812 of 1239. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/agent-zero.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/agent-zero.json
- OpenMausBot: grade B, 65.4/100, rank #368 of 1239. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/openmausbot.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/openmausbot.json
- Best agent harnesses and coding agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/agent-harnesses/index.md
- All 875 harnesses comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-harnesses/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Agent Zero (C)

Good for: A technical owner who wants an agent with its own Linux machine, reachable from Telegram, WhatsApp or email, with scheduled tasks and editable memory.

Ahead on:
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 50

Also in its favour:
- No key needed to call it

Watch for: No approval step before shell commands, file changes or outgoing messages. Tool Access defaults to allow

### OpenMausBot (B)

Good for: A person or an outside agent who wants several CLI agents (Claude Code, Codex, Grok, ACP CLIs) organised as named bots with their own computers, routines and approvals, driven by MCP or a CLI.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 90 against 64
- Agent ergonomics, 77 against 62
- Security & auth, 59 against 54

Also in its favour:
- Runs on your own machine
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: New bots start at Full access, which approves provider permission requests without a card


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Agent Zero | OpenMausBot | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 57 | 60 | OpenMausBot +3 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 64 | 90 | OpenMausBot +26 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 62 | 77 | OpenMausBot +15 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 54 | 59 | OpenMausBot +5 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 50 | Agent Zero +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 74 | Agent Zero +1 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 59 | 59 | even |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -6 | -2 | |
| **Total** | | **54.6 · C** | **65.4 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Agent Zero | OpenMausBot |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Agent Zero, s.r.o. | Supamaus Software Private Limited |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  | stdio |
| Auth | None | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Tools exposed | none | 20 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-09-23 | 2026-10-30 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | 2026-10-10 |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | 2026-10-18 |
| Customer content may train models |  | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access |  | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking |  | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice |  | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |  | not found in the text |
| Popularity | 19k stars | 8.2k stars, 3.5k npm/wk |

## Verdicts

**Agent Zero.** Self-hosted under the MIT licence, with nine releases in the 90 days to 12 October 2026 and breaking changes listed in the release notes. The agent runs shell commands in its container with no approval step, the web interface has no login by default, and five CVEs from the past year have no published GitHub advisory.

**OpenMausBot.** A bounded 20-tool MCP server with typed schemas, annotations and idempotent sends, and a headless CLI with JSON output and exit codes, let another agent hand work to a bot team and wait on it. New bots start at Full access, so provider permission requests pass without a card, and usage analytics stay on until switched off.

## Before you call either

### Agent Zero

1. Set a UI login and password in Settings before publishing the port or opening a tunnel. The default has none
2. Fill `allowed_users`, `allowed_numbers` or `sender_whitelist` before enabling a channel. An empty list accepts every sender
3. Enable the Infection Check plugin when the agent reads mail, web pages or MCP results. It ships disabled
4. Run v2.12 or later. It fixes a Telegram webhook authentication bypass and a WhatsApp media path traversal
5. Call `POST /api_message` with the `X-API-KEY` header. The token changes when the UI login or password changes

### OpenMausBot

1. Ask the owner for a pairing code from Settings > Phone, exchange it at `POST /api/auth/pair`, and set `OPENMAUSBOT_TOKEN` with an explicit `OMB_PORT`
2. Pass a `send_id` with every `send_bot_message` and `send_channel_message`, so a retry returns the first receipt
3. Use `wait_for_conversation` instead of polling, and on `needs-user` stop and tell the owner a card is waiting
4. Check a bot's access level with the owner before sending work. New bots run at Full access unless defaults were changed
5. Ask the owner to switch off Settings > General > Usage analytics if nothing beyond model calls should leave the machine

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Agent Zero or OpenMausBot?

OpenMausBot scores 65.4 (B) on agent readiness against Agent Zero's 54.6 (C), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Agent Zero leads on payments & pricing.

### Are Agent Zero and OpenMausBot open source?

Yes. Agent Zero is open source (MIT). OpenMausBot is open source (Apache-2.0).


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openmausbot.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openmausbot.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "agent-zero", "b": "openmausbot"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare agent-zero openmausbot`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/agent-zero.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/openmausbot.json

## Other comparisons with Agent Zero or OpenMausBot

- [Agent Zero vs Aider](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-aider.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Amp](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-amp.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Antigravity CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-antigravity-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Auggie CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-auggie.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Claude Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-claude-code.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-cline.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Crush](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-crush.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Cursor CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-cursor-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs DeepSeek Harness (dsh)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-deepseek-harness.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Devin](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-devin.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Droid CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-droid-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Pi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-earendil-pi.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Gemini CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-gemini-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs GitHub Copilot CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-github-copilot-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs goose](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-goose.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-harness2.md)
- [Agent Zero vs HarnessRouter](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-harnessrouter.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Jules](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-jules.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Junie CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-junie.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Kilo Code CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-kilo-code-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Kimi Code CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-kimi-code-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Kiro CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-kiro-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs mini-swe-agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-mini-swe-agent.md)
- [Agent Zero vs MiniMax Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-minimax-code.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Mistral Vibe CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-mistral-vibe-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Muse Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-muse-code.md)
- [Agent Zero vs OpenAI Codex](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openai-codex.md)
- [Agent Zero vs OpenCode](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-opencode.md)
- [Agent Zero vs OpenHands](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-openhands.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Prime Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-prime-agent.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Qoder CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-qoder-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Qwen Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-qwen-code.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Mirror CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-reflection-mirror.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Rovo Dev CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-rovo-dev-cli.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Unstoppable](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-unstoppable.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Vibe-Trading](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-vibe-trading.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-warp.md)
- [Aider vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/aider-vs-openmausbot.md)
- [Amp vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amp-vs-openmausbot.md)
- [Antigravity CLI vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/antigravity-cli-vs-openmausbot.md)
- [Auggie CLI vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/auggie-vs-openmausbot.md)
- [Claude Code vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-code-vs-openmausbot.md)
- [Cline vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-openmausbot.md)
- [Crush vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/crush-vs-openmausbot.md)
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- [Droid CLI vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/droid-cli-vs-openmausbot.md)
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- [OpenCode vs OpenMausBot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/opencode-vs-openmausbot.md)
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- [OpenMausBot vs Unstoppable](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openmausbot-vs-unstoppable.md)
- [OpenMausBot vs Vibe-Trading](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openmausbot-vs-vibe-trading.md)
- [OpenMausBot vs Warp (Warp Agent CLI and the Oz Agent API)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openmausbot-vs-warp.md)

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Query this catalogue directly over MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (Streamable HTTP, no key). How: https://www.anchorterminal.com/agents/#mcp