# Agent Zero vs Orca

> Orca scores 57.4 (C) to Agent Zero's 46 (D) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-orca
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-orca.md (~5,200 tokens)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (the key docs and every listing in one file, at most 16 MB, about 4 million tokens: 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)
- DNS: dig +short TXT <slug>.grade.anchorterminal.com (the grade as a DNS TXT record, for a sandbox with no HTTP where names still resolve; also top., best.<category>. and <a>.vs.<b>. under the zone, and the same under grade.letme.dev)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Orca scores 57.4 (C) on agent readiness against Agent Zero's 46 (D), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. Agent Zero leads on security & auth, payments & pricing and transparency & trust. Both do agent harnesses.

- Agent Zero: grade D, 46/100, rank #1168 of 1486. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/agent-zero.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/agent-zero.json
- Orca: grade C, 57.4/100, rank #791 of 1486. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/orca.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/orca.json
- Best agent harnesses and coding agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/agent-harnesses/index.md
- All 1500 harnesses comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-harnesses/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Agent Zero (D)

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:
- Security & auth, 54 against 43
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 40
- Transparency & trust, 64 against 54

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

### Orca (C)

Good for: Developers who want an orchestrator agent to split work across parallel coding agents, on desktop or mobile.

Ahead on:
- Agent ergonomics, 70 against 62

Also in its favour:
- No incidents deducted, where Agent Zero loses 15 points for them

Watch for: Anonymous usage data collected by default, with an opt-out


## Why the edge

### Payments & pricing: Agent Zero +20

- Agent Zero (60): Read with the self-hosted rule. No payment protocol in the source (0). Free under MIT with nothing to buy for the software, so 20, 20 and 20 on the last three lines. It starts with one Docker command and no account. Model usage is billed by whichever provider the owner configures, or costs nothing with a local model. The vendor's site also describes a beta LLM API whose daily quota depends on staking its A0T token. That is separate from the software and not scored.
- Orca (40): Scored on the cloud option. No protocol (0). The cloud price wasn't found on the pages read (0). The desktop app is free and MIT with no card (20). The local app needs no sign-up that we found (20). 0 + 0 + 20 + 20 = 40.

### Security & auth: Agent Zero +11

- Agent Zero (54): Harness reading of the framework checklist, the one the Goose calibration dossier uses. 30 for what leaves the machine by default, 20 for approvals and sandboxing, 15 for prompt-injection posture, 15 for audit and 20 for the security programme. No usage telemetry was found in the source. An update check, on by default, posts the version and a 20-character SHA-256 hash of a random per-install id to api.agent-zero.ai. The Update Checker settings page says only that ID and the version are sent and has an off switch. Something still leaves the machine by default, so the partial is kept (22). The agent works inside a Docker container built on Kali Linux and runs as root there. Tool Access can block tools by project or profile and defaults to allow, host access through the A0 CLI is scoped by read, write and execute permissions, and no approval step was found before a shell command, a file deletion or an outgoing message. The web interface has no login until a username is set (10). Infection Check audits the agent's reasoning with a second model before each tool call and ships disabled. Scanners check plugins, skills and MCP servers before install. The channel allow-lists accept every sender when empty, and the email filter matches the claimed From address only, which the plugin README states (7). Chat logs, visible tool steps and Time Travel snapshots, with no per-call audit log. Per-process log files were removed in v2.5 (9). No SECURITY.md on 4 November, security.txt answered 404 on 12 October, and none of the eight CVEs published from 17 March to 22 October 2026 came from the vendor (VulDB, VulnCheck, MITRE and CISA assigned them). A security-review ledger in the repository records two findings, and the v2.12 notes name both fixes (6, a partial kept).
- Orca (43): Harness reading. Anonymous usage data with an opt-out, per the README's link to its telemetry docs (15 of 30). Worktrees per agent and a sandboxed Linux build (12 of 20). No prompt-injection guidance (5). No audit log (5). A dependency-security workflow (6 of 20). 15 + 12 + 5 + 5 + 6 = 43.

### Transparency & trust: Agent Zero +10

- Agent Zero (64): MIT, copyright Agent Zero, s.r.o. (30). No privacy policy for the software was found. The site's cookie notice covers the website, and its terms (14 May 2026) cover the community platform. The docs say where data lives (chats, memory, secrets and settings under `/a0/usr`) and warn that model providers see what is sent to them only in general terms, with no retention statement (8 of 30). Release notes list breaking changes and removals with the release date, and one deprecated alias is named. No deprecation policy or notice period was found (8 of 20, a partial kept). No usage telemetry was found in the source. The update check is described on its settings page, which says it sends only a randomised, hashed install ID and the version number, and the same page turns it off. The ID is a hash of a random per-install token, a pseudonym under this run's reading, so the statement holds (20). 30 + 8 + 8 + 20 = 66.
- Orca (54): MIT (30). Privacy and telemetry docs on the site (not read) (18 of 30). No deprecation policy (5). Disclosed with an opt-out (15 of 20). 30 + 18 + 5 + 15 = 68.

### Agent ergonomics: Orca +8

- Agent Zero (62): Harness reading, scored on what a person or program driving it must supply. Skills load on demand, blocked tools are removed from the prompt, chats can be compacted, and the v2.12 notes report Codex input falling from about 16.4K to 11.3K tokens, a vendor figure (18 of 25). An MCP tool timeout of 120 seconds, a limit of five consecutive unusable responses and context-window handling are set by default. No turn or spend limit was found in the reviewed docs (11 of 20). Other programs reach it through `POST /api_message`, an optional MCP server, A2A and an ACP bridge, with request and response shapes left to the source (11 of 20). An error-retry plugin, saved chats, a message queue, backups and Time Travel snapshots with diff and revert (14 of 20). One Docker command starts it and a wizard sets the model, but there is no SDK and the default has no login (8 of 15).
- Orca (70): Harness reading. An orchestrator agent that splits work across workers in their own workspaces, chat or raw CLI, a browser and a CLI in one app (70).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Agent Zero | Orca | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 57 | 58 | Orca +1 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 64 | 65 | Orca +1 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 62 | 70 | Orca +8 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 54 | 43 | Agent Zero +11 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 40 | Agent Zero +20 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 75 | even |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 64 | 54 | Agent Zero +10 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -15 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **46 · D** | **57.4 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Agent Zero | Orca |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Agent Zero, s.r.o. | Lovecast Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | None | None |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | MIT |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-11-01 | 2026-11-06 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Popularity | 19k stars | none |

## How the scores have moved

### Agent Zero

- -8.6 on 4 November 2026 (C to D): correction
- +0.3 on 28 October 2026: new evidence
- +0.1 on 27 October 2026: checklist

### Orca

No score change since it was listed.

## Verdicts

**Agent Zero.** Self-hosted under the MIT licence, with seven releases from 12 August to 1 November 2026 and breaking changes listed in minor-release notes. The agent runs shell commands in its container with no approval step, the web interface has no login by default, and eight CVEs from the past year were published by third parties with no vendor advisory.

**Orca.** An open-source orchestrator for coding agents with worker agents in their own worktrees, chat and terminal views, a browser and a CLI, on desktop and mobile, with heavy test automation. It collects anonymous usage data by default, and the cloud option's pricing wasn't found.

## 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

### Orca

1. See the telemetry docs on onorca.dev to opt out of anonymous usage data
2. Use the orchestration CLI to hand a large task to one agent that starts workers

## Questions

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

Orca scores 57.4 (C) on agent readiness against Agent Zero's 46 (D), and leads in 3 of 7 scored categories. Agent Zero leads on security & auth, payments & pricing and transparency & trust.

### Are Agent Zero and Orca open source?

Yes. Agent Zero is open source (MIT). Orca is open source (MIT).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with Agent Zero or Orca

- [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 AXLR](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-axlr.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 Conductor](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-conductor.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 dsh-superagent (DeepSeek)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-deepseek-superagent.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Devin](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-devin.md)
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- [Agent Zero vs Pi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-earendil-pi.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Emdash](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-emdash.md)
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- [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)
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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