Head to head · Assistants reached by message · October 2026 research run
Caddy vs Orchid
Orchid scores 20.2 (F) on agent readiness against Caddy's 16.7 (F), and leads in 2 of 7 scored categories. Caddy leads on payments & pricing and maintenance & community. Both do assistants reached by message.
Best AI personal assistants that act for one person · All 834 assistants comparisons
Which one, for what
Caddy F
Best for People who want a free assistant in iMessage or RCS that watches mail, calendars and work tools and asks before acting.
Ahead on
- Payments & pricing, 30 against 10
- Maintenance & community, 55 against 24
Watch for
No API, MCP server or A2A endpoint for an outside agent.
Orchid F
Best for A founder or operator who wants Gmail and calendar triage by text with approval before anything leaves.
Ahead on
- Reliability, 50 against 10
- Transparency & trust, 60 against 52
Watch for
No API, MCP server or A2A endpoint for an outside agent.
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Caddy | Orchid | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 10 | 50 | Orchid +40 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 10 | 10 | even |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 0 | 0 | even |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 0 | 0 | even |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 30 | 10 | Caddy +20 |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 55 | 24 | Caddy +31 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 52 | 60 | Orchid +8 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | F 16.7/100 | F 20.2/100 |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Caddy | Orchid |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | Platform | Platform |
| Vendor | Caddy Technologies Inc. | Zero Email, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | ||
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Free | Paid |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Closed service under Caddy's Terms of Service (Caddy Technologies Inc., last updated 27 April 2026). | Closed service under Orchid's Terms of Service (Zero Email, Inc., last updated 16 January 2026). |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-13 | none |
| Terms last updated | ||
| Privacy policy last updated | ||
| Customer content may train models | ||
| Terms restrict automated access | ||
| Terms restrict benchmarking | ||
| Terms or service can change without notice | ||
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |
Verdicts
Caddy
Caddy is a free iMessage and RCS assistant in public beta that watches connected mail, calendars and work apps and asks before sending email or changing data. No outside agent can call it, and no status page, changelog or security contact was found, though its iOS app ships every week or two.
Orchid
Orchid is a paid executive assistant over iMessage, SMS and Telegram that holds drafts and calendar holds until the owner approves, with a public status page and a named subprocessor list. No outside agent can call it, there's no free tier, and its privacy policy allows training a personal model while its blog says it never trains.
Before you call either
Caddy
- Don't plan to call Caddy from another agent. It answers the owner's text messages, Siri and group chats it's added to.
- Expect Caddy to ask the owner before it sends email or creates an invite.
Orchid
- Don't plan to call Orchid from another agent. It answers only the owner's iMessage, SMS and Telegram threads.
- Check status.orchid.ai before telling the owner Orchid is down. The 7 August incident moved it to a new number.
- Tell the owner that drafts and holds wait for their approval unless they widen it.
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Caddy or Orchid?
Orchid scores 20.2 (F) on agent readiness against Caddy's 16.7 (F), and leads in 2 of 7 scored categories. Caddy leads on payments & pricing and maintenance & community.
Other comparisons with Caddy or Orchid
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- nanobot vs Orchid
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- Dots vs Orchid
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- OpenInstinct vs Orchid
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- Orchid vs Pally
- Orchid vs PicoClaw
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- AstrBot vs Caddy
- Boski vs Caddy
- Caddy vs CowAgent
- Caddy vs folk
- Caddy vs GAIA
- Caddy vs Gemini Spark
- Caddy vs Grok Bot
- Caddy vs Haven
- Caddy vs Hermes Agent
- Caddy vs Instinct
- Caddy vs IronClaw
- Caddy vs Leon
- Caddy vs Lindy
- Caddy vs nanobot
- Caddy vs NanoClaw
- Caddy vs Dots
- Caddy vs OpenClaw
- Caddy vs PicoClaw
- Caddy vs Poke
- Caddy vs QwenPaw
- Caddy vs Town
- Caddy vs ZeroClaw
- Caddy vs Zo Computer
- Caddy vs Natura tinyNature
- Caddy vs Pally
- Caddy vs Tomo
- Caddy vs Wajo (Fo)
- Gemini Spark vs Orchid
- Leon vs Orchid
- Natura tinyNature vs Orchid
- Orchid vs Wajo (Fo)
- Caddy vs Talorys
- Orchid vs Talorys
Disclosure
Caddy competes with LocalGhost, which Anchor Terminal's founder builds. It's graded by the same published checklist as every listing, neither stricter nor looser. Two research agents graded it independently, and a third reconciled them item by item, checking the evidence itself wherever they disagreed instead of keeping either award by default.
Orchid competes with LocalGhost, which Anchor Terminal's founder builds. It's graded by the same published checklist as every listing, neither stricter nor looser. Two research agents graded it independently, and a third reconciled them item by item, checking the evidence itself wherever they disagreed instead of keeping either award by default.
Machine-readable
- This page as Markdown
/compare/caddy-app-vs-orchid-ai.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/caddy-app.json·/api/v1/tools/orchid-ai.json - From a terminal
anchor compare caddy-app orchid-ai(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "caddy-app", "b": "orchid-ai"}at/mcp, no key