Head to head · Agent memory · October 2026 research run

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory vs MemMachine

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory scores 79.7 (A) on agent readiness against MemMachine's 58 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. MemMachine leads on payments & pricing. Both do agent memory.

Best memory layers for AI agents · All 353 memory comparisons

Which one, for what

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory A

Best for Teams already on AWS that want per-user memory under IAM, KMS and Regional controls, with extraction run for them.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 88 against 51
  • Schema & documentation, 92 against 79
  • Agent ergonomics, 86 against 65
  • Security & auth, 87 against 41
  • Transparency & trust, 79 against 57

Also in its favour

  • Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
  • A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install

Watch for

Long-term extraction is asynchronous. The docs say records appear within seconds to minutes after a write

MemMachine C

Best for Self-hosted memory for agent frameworks that want episodic and profile memory with many integrations.

Ahead on

  • Payments & pricing, 40 against 30

Also in its favour

  • No key needed to call it
  • Open source

Watch for

Version 0.4.0 of 6 October 2026, pre-1.0, with no changelog file in the repository

Why the edge

Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.

Security & auth Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +46

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory 87

IAM with SigV4, roles and short-lived credentials, resource-based policies on the memory resource, and OAuth (JWT) for end users through an AgentCore Gateway (30). Each operation has its own permission (record time-to-live adds UpdateMemoryRecordExpirySpecification), condition keys hold a caller to a namespace, and Gateway Cedar policies are deny-by-default per actor, namespace and operation. The three batch operations are outside those policies, and deletes are permanent with no confirmation step (17 of 20). The guide names memory poisoning and prompt injection, places prevention with the customer, and recommends Bedrock Guardrails on input before CreateEvent and adversarial testing. The MCP server README says retrieved records are untrusted input (12 of 15). CloudWatch metrics and optional vended logs for extraction. The data protection page recommends CloudTrail in general terms, and we found no Memory-specific CloudTrail page such as Gateway and Registry have (10 of 15). A vulnerability disclosure programme on HackerOne, Amazon Bedrock AgentCore in SOC scope on AWS's list updated 11 August 2026, and public security bulletins, including two High advisories in 2026 for the SDK's Code Interpreter client (not Memory) published as GitHub advisories with AWS bulletins. aws.amazon.com/.well-known/security.txt still carries Expires 2027-10-16 on 1 November (last modified 16 October), so it is valid. The disclosure policy at vdp.aws.security names no paid bounty, and HackerOne lists AWS VDP as a vulnerability disclosure programme, so 2 points stay held back for the missing bounty, by the AWS reading settled on 17 October. (18 of 20). 30+17+12+10+18 = 87.

MemMachine 41

Framework reading for software the owner runs. The server has no authentication and no security scheme in its OpenAPI document (15 of 30). No read-only mode or confirmation for deletes (5 of 20). No guidance on recalled memories as untrusted text (4 of 15). No audit log on the self-hosted server; the hosted console shows usage (5 of 15). SECURITY.md with GitHub private reporting and a two-business-day acknowledgement, with security-audit and SBOM workflows; no security.txt or certification (12 of 20). Total 41.

Reliability Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +37

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory 88

Graded as a hosted API, the AWS data plane that agents call. AWS Health Dashboard with per-service, per-Region history and RSS feeds (20). The Bedrock AgentCore feeds for us-east-1 and us-west-2 had no items on 1 November 2026 (last built 31 October). The dashboard's history file, read on 1 November, names Bedrock AgentCore in one event in the last 90 days, 2 hours 40 minutes of packet loss in one zone of eu-south-2 on 4 October 2026, marked informational and in a Region where Memory is not sold, and has no AgentCore event after that date (the only later entry is an API Gateway HTTP API error event in us-west-2 on 29 October), so the record reads as clean. The public dashboard lists only broad events (30). Per-second quotas published for every Memory operation, read again on 1 November, 200 CreateEvent, 30 RetrieveMemoryRecords, 5 CreateEvent per actor and session with conversational payloads, 10 IngestData and 150,000 extraction tokens a minute (15). 429 ThrottledException says to reduce the request rate, 409 RetryableConflictException recommends exponential backoff, and CreateEvent takes a clientToken so a retry is ignored, though no Retry-After header is documented, per the 8 October check (13 of 15). No SLA found for Memory. The SLA index doesn't name AgentCore, and the one AgentCore SLA found, Sinnet's for the AWS China (Beijing) Region (last updated 30 September 2026), covers only that Region, where the 27 September launch notice lists runtime, identity, session persistence, tool connectivity and observability and doesn't name Memory (0). Generally available since October 2025 per the release notes (10).

MemMachine 51

Local-software lines, as a server the owner runs. memmachine-server and memmachine-client on PyPI with Python versions stated, a Docker image and a compose script (20). pytest, integration and installation-test workflows exist, but GitHub's API answered with a rate limit, so run results were unread (15 of 25, unchecked). 292 open issues and pull requests; the newest bug reports, including a 429 from a provider surfacing as a 500 and a 0.4.0 configuration that no longer starts, have zero to two replies (10 of 25). No changelog file, release notes only on GitHub, which weren't read, and pre-1.0 tags (6 of 15). Version 0.4.0 (0). Total 51.

Transparency & trust Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +22

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory 79

Closed service under the AWS Customer Agreement and Service Terms (updated 30 October 2026), with the Python SDK and CLI under Apache-2.0 (18 of 30, as for S3). Section 50.3 of the Service Terms does not list Bedrock or AgentCore among the services whose content AWS may use for improvement, events expire after 7 to 365 days, long-term records can carry an optional time-to-live since October 2026 (by default they do not expire), records are encrypted at rest with KMS, and the terms carry the AWS DPA. The AgentCore data protection page has Gateway-specific statements and none for Memory, and no retention period for deleted records was found (22 of 30). The pricing page dates the short-term pricing change (through 5 October, as of 6 October 2026), but no deprecation policy for the Memory API was found (6 of 20). A sub-processor page updated 30 October 2026 and a per-Region availability table. Built-in strategies may process event text in another Region of the same geography, which the cross-Region inference page states (18 of 20).

MemMachine 57

Apache-2.0 (30). The terms say hosted customer data is destroyed on termination, with no period, and use usage data only in aggregate; the privacy policy wasn't read (12 of 30). No deprecation policy or notices found (3 of 20). No telemetry calls found in the server or client source, and the docs don't address it (10 of 20). Total 55.

Agent ergonomics Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +21

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory 86

Graded on the API. RetrieveMemoryRecords returns record summaries with a relevance score, sized by topK (default 10, maximum 100) and maxResults (default 20), and long-term records stand in for full history, but no field selection was found (20 of 25). nextToken pagination, namespace and namespace path scoping, a strategy filter and metadata filters (20). Typed exceptions with HTTP codes and advice in each description. A quota breach returns 402 ServiceQuotaExceededException beside the 429 ThrottledException, which a generic client may misread (18 of 20). clientToken on CreateEvent, immutable events and side-effect-free reads. We did not confirm a token on IngestData or the batch operations (18 of 20). SDKs in Python, JavaScript, Java, Go and five other languages plus a higher-level Python SDK, but a memory resource must exist first (2 to 3 minutes to create), eventTimestamp is required and every call needs SigV4 signing (10 of 15). The awslabs MCP server's 21 Memory tools sit among 122, and one environment variable registers Memory alone.

MemMachine 65

Searches take limit and filter options for episodic and semantic results (20 of 25). Memories can be listed and filtered by scope (15 of 20). Validation errors are typed; other failures are less clear, as the 429-to-500 issue shows (10 of 20). No idempotency keys or safe-retry guidance found (5 of 20). Python and TypeScript clients and a five-line quick start, once the import is fixed (15). Total 65.

Schema & documentation Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +13

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory 92

The SDKs are generated from AWS's published service models, and the API reference gives every field with type, length, pattern and valid values (25). The developer guide has an llms.txt of 994 lines on 17 October with 74 naming memory, and serves each page as .md (10). The guides say when to use IngestData instead of CreateEvent, which payload types are extracted, and how long-term memory differs from retrieval-augmented generation, but give little on when the service is the wrong tool (16 of 20). Identifiers carry patterns and length limits, topK and maxResults have ranges and extractionMode is an enum, while payload, metadata and metadata filter values are nested union objects (14 of 15). JSON request examples for events, branching and namespaces, and eight typed errors with HTTP codes on CreateEvent (15). Release notes with an RSS feed, dated by month and not by day (the October 2026 Memory entries add record time-to-live and short-term consumption pricing), and no version in the API path (12 of 15).

MemMachine 79

OpenAPI documents for the server (54 operations) and the hosted platform (12) (25). llms.txt on docs.memmachine.ai with Markdown pages (10). Every operation has a description, and the docs explain memory types and scoping (15 of 20). Typed request models generated from the server, with search options for limits and filters (12 of 15). Examples for each client and the MCP tools, but only 422 is documented on the server and the README's first example doesn't run (8 of 15). /api/v2 paths and tagged releases, no changelog (9 of 15). Total 79.

Payments & pricing MemMachine +10

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory 30

No x402, MPP or L402 on the Memory endpoints (0). Per-GB, per-record and per-retrieval prices published without a login, with a worked example (20). No Memory-specific free tier or sandbox. New AWS accounts get up to $200 in Free Tier credits, and the Free Tier FAQ says most new customers don't need a payment method while AWS may still ask for one, so half, as on our other AWS listings (10). A person creates the AWS account and sets up IAM (0).

MemMachine 40

Self-hosted rule, with the price lines read for the hosted platform. No x402, MPP or L402 (0 of 40). No hosted prices found on the site or docs (0). Free to self-host with no card (20). An agent can install it from PyPI with no account (20). Total 40.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runAmazon Bedrock AgentCore MemoryMemMachineEdge
Reliability16%208851Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +37
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.29279Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +13
Agent ergonomics13%16.28665Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +21
Security & auth14%17.58741Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +46
Payments & pricing10%12.53040MemMachine +10
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88383even
Transparency & trust7%8.87957Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory +22
Negative events≤1500
TotalA 79.7/100C 58/100

Facts side by side

FactAmazon Bedrock AgentCore MemoryMemMachine
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorAmazon Web ServicesMemVerge, Inc.
Hosted endpointhttps://bedrock-agentcore.{region}.amazonaws.comno (local only)
TransportsHTTP, stdioHTTP, stdio, Streamable HTTP
AuthOAuth or keyNone
PricingPay per useFreemium
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under the AWS Customer Agreement and Service Terms. The bedrock-agentcore Python SDK and the @aws/agentcore CLI are Apache-2.0Apache-2.0
Tools exposed213
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-10-302026-10-08
Terms last updated2026-10-01no date given
Privacy policy last updated2026-05-182026-05-20
Customer content may train modelsyes, with an opt-outnot found in the text
Terms restrict automated accessyesyes
Terms restrict benchmarkingyesyes
Terms or service can change without noticeyesnot found in the text
Arbitration or class-action waivernot found in the textyes
Popularity776 stars, 1.1M npm/wk3.1k stars, 28 npm/wk, 581 PyPI/wk
Agent reviews3.5/5 (4)none

How the scores have moved

Verdicts

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory

Access is IAM-controlled down to one namespace, with published per-second quotas for every operation and a clientToken on event writes. Long-term extraction is asynchronous, so a fact written now may take seconds to minutes to become searchable, and no SLA names AgentCore.

MemMachine

MemMachine is an Apache-2.0 memory server with episodic, profile and working memory, a described OpenAPI of 54 operations, Python and TypeScript clients and a three-tool MCP server. It is version 0.4.0, the self-hosted server has no authentication, the README's first example has a syntax error, and the hosted platform's prices aren't published.

Before you call either

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory

  1. Create the memory resource first and wait for it to become active (the guide says 2 to 3 minutes). Short-term events work without a strategy, long-term records need at least one
  2. Don't search for a fact straight after CreateEvent. Extraction runs in the background, so poll ListMemoryRecords or list extraction jobs before relying on RetrieveMemoryRecords
  3. Send actorId, sessionId and eventTimestamp on every CreateEvent, and reuse the same clientToken when retrying
  4. Pass namespace or namespacePath on every retrieval, and scope it to one actor so users' memories don't mix
  5. Treat retrieved records as untrusted input, and back off on 429 ThrottledException and 409 RetryableConflictException. A quota breach returns 402 ServiceQuotaExceededException

MemMachine

  1. Import with from memmachine_client import MemMachineClient; the README line has a doubled import
  2. Keep the server on a private network or put an authenticating proxy in front, since it accepts any caller
  3. Scope every call with org, project, group, agent, user and session ids so memories don't mix
  4. Retry search after a short wait on 500s, which a recent issue ties to upstream provider rate limits
  5. Treat recalled episodes as untrusted text from past conversations

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory or MemMachine?

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory scores 79.7 (A) on agent readiness against MemMachine's 58 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. MemMachine leads on payments & pricing.

Do Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory and MemMachine need an API key?

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in. MemMachine needs no key.

Can an agent call Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory and MemMachine without installing anything?

Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory has a hosted endpoint at https://bedrock-agentcore.{region}.amazonaws.com. MemMachine runs on your own machine, with no hosted endpoint listed.

Are Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory and MemMachine open source?

No open-source release is listed for Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory. MemMachine is open source (Apache-2.0).

Other comparisons with Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Memory or MemMachine

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