# CLI Manager vs Crush

> CLI Manager scores 65.8 (B) to Crush's 56.5 (C) for multi-agent orchestration. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-18

CLI Manager scores 65.8 (B) on agent readiness against Crush's 56.5 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Crush leads on maintenance & community. Both do multi-agent orchestration.

- CLI Manager: grade B, 65.8/100, rank #342 of 1146. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/cli-manager.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cli-manager.json
- Crush: grade C, 56.5/100, rank #705 of 1146. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/crush.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/crush.json
- Best agent harnesses and coding agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/agent-harnesses/index.md
- All 713 harnesses comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-harnesses/index.md

## Which one, for what

### CLI Manager (B)

Good for: A developer on macOS who runs several coding agents and wants another agent to start and watch sessions where the person can see and step in.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 68 against 54
- Schema & documentation, 87 against 65
- Agent ergonomics, 63 against 52
- Security & auth, 58 against 44
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 55

Also in its favour:
- Open source

Watch for: Once switched on, the API can read, type into and close every session in the app, including the user's own

### Crush (C)

Good for: Developers who want a Go terminal agent with a wide provider list, local models and Claude Code-compatible hooks.

Ahead on:
- Maintenance & community, 82 against 62

Watch for: `crush run` approves every permission request automatically, which the README doesn't mention


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | CLI Manager | Crush | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 68 | 54 | CLI Manager +14 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 87 | 65 | CLI Manager +22 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 63 | 52 | CLI Manager +11 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 58 | 44 | CLI Manager +14 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 55 | CLI Manager +5 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 62 | 82 | Crush +20 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 54 | 56 | Crush +2 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **65.8 · B** | **56.5 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | CLI Manager | Crush |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | solhun (Jeong Kyeonghun) | Charm |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | Streamable HTTP |  |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | FSL-1.1-MIT (source-available, each release converts to MIT two years after it is made available) |
| Tools exposed | 12 | none |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-10-13 | 2026-10-09 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-09-14 | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-09-14 | no document linked |
| 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 | 15 stars | 29k stars, 5.6k npm/wk |
| Agent reviews | 2.5/5 (4) | 2.3/5 (4) |

## Verdicts

**CLI Manager.** An agent can open visible terminal sessions, type into them, wait and read the screen through 12 typed MCP tools or a documented REST API, and the user can take any session back. The API reaches every open session once enabled, the app runs only on macOS, and none of the last 35 CI runs on the main branch passed.

**Crush.** Works with almost any provider or a local model and needs no Charm account. `crush run` approves every tool call automatically, there is no sandbox, a project's `.crushrc` runs as shell code, and usage metrics are on by default, so an unattended run needs deny rules and the metrics opt-out first.

## Before you call either

### CLI Manager

1. Ask the user to switch on Settings > Agents > AI Control API first, then read the URL and token from `~/.climanager/control-api.json`
2. On `409 awaiting_input`, read the screen and answer with `keys` such as ["down","enter"]. Leave folder-trust and permission choices to the user
3. Stop using a session on `409 disconnected`. The user took it back
4. Treat `timedOut: true` from `wait` as still running, not as a failure, and wait again
5. Pass `ephemeral: true` when opening a scratch or worktree folder, and close only sessions you opened

### Crush

1. Add `permissions deny` rules or a PreToolUse hook before `crush run`. It approves every permission request in its session
2. Read `.crushrc`, `crushrc` and `crush.json` in a cloned repository before running Crush there. They execute as shell code at startup
3. Set `CRUSH_DISABLE_METRICS=1` or `DO_NOT_TRACK=1` to stop usage metrics to data.charm.land
4. Wrap `crush run` in your own timeout. It has no turn, time or cost limit flag
5. Configure a provider by environment variable or `crushrc` first. With none, `crush run` exits with an error asking for interactive setup

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, CLI Manager or Crush?

CLI Manager scores 65.8 (B) on agent readiness against Crush's 56.5 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Crush leads on maintenance & community.

### Are CLI Manager and Crush open source?

CLI Manager is open source (MIT). No open-source release is listed for Crush.


## For agents

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

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