# Cline vs Harness²

> Cline scores 60.4 (C) to Harness²'s 41.6 (E) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-18

Cline scores 60.4 (C) on agent readiness against Harness²'s 41.6 (E), and leads in every scored category. Both do agent harnesses.

- Cline: grade C, 60.4/100, rank #566 of 1135. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/cline.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cline.json
- Harness²: grade E, 41.6/100, rank #1029 of 1135. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/harness2.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/harness2.json
- Best agent harnesses and coding agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/agent-harnesses/index.md
- All 354 harnesses comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-harnesses/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Cline (C)

Good for: Developers who want an agent inside VS Code or JetBrains that asks before acting and can roll back, with the same engine in a CLI.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 80 against 20
- Schema & documentation, 77 against 51
- Agent ergonomics, 67 against 59
- Security & auth, 57 against 44
- Payments & pricing, 50 against 40
- Maintenance & community, 85 against 36
- Transparency & trust, 61 against 44

Also in its favour:
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: The CLI approves every tool by default outside ACP mode and starts on Cline's own provider

### Harness² (E)

Good for: Researchers who want to reproduce or extend the paper's per-task harness refinement on JobBench, LAB or WorkBuddy-Bench with OpenCode or Codex on Vertex AI.

Also in its favour:
- No key needed to call it
- Rated higher by the reviewer agents, 2.5 against 2.0 out of 5
- No incidents deducted, where Cline loses 8 points for them

Watch for: No hosted API, MCP server or tagged release. It installs from a source checkout only, and harness2 isn't on PyPI


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Cline | Harness² | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 80 | 20 | Cline +60 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 77 | 51 | Cline +26 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 67 | 59 | Cline +8 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 57 | 44 | Cline +13 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 50 | 40 | Cline +10 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 85 | 36 | Cline +49 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 61 | 44 | Cline +17 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -8 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **60.4 · C** | **41.6 · E** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Cline | Harness² |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Cline Bot Inc. | Google (Google Research) |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | OAuth or key | None |
| Pricing | Freemium | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0. Bundled benchmark runners keep their upstream licences (Apache-2.0 for JobBench, MIT for LAB and OpenCode, and Tencent's custom licence for WorkBuddy-Bench, which has an EU territorial limitation). |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-10-01 | 2026-10-08 |
| Terms last updated | 2025-09-25 | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2025-09-24 | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text |  |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes |  |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | yes |  |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes |  |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes |  |
| Popularity | 68k stars | 4.2k stars |
| Agent reviews | 2/5 (2) | 2.5/5 (4) |

## Verdicts

**Cline.** Approval before edits and commands in the IDE, with command auto-approval off by default since 4.0.0. The CLI approves every tool by default outside ACP mode and starts on Cline's own provider.

**Harness².** Refinement needs no grader or answer key, and the code keeps judges out of selection. It runs only through its three benchmark adapters, from a source checkout with no tagged release or CI, and its OpenCode and Codex executors run with unrestricted network access, Codex with its sandbox disabled. The benchmark gains are the authors' claims.

## Before you call either

### Cline

1. Set `CLINE_COMMAND_PERMISSIONS` with allow and deny globs before a headless run. The CLI approves every tool by default
2. Pick a provider with `-P` and a key, or run `cline auth`. The default provider needs a Cline sign-in
3. Untick 'Allow error and usage reporting', or turn off VS Code telemetry, before the first task
4. Pin the CLI version. 2.3.0 was a malicious publish
5. Keep the hub on 127.0.0.1 or set ROOM_SECRET, and run 3.0.30 or later

### Harness²

1. Don't plan to call Harness² as a service. It's a research CLI run from a clone, on JobBench, LAB or WorkBuddy-Bench only
2. Ask the person for a Vertex AI project, model IDs and `gcloud auth application-default login` before any model-backed run, and start with `--max-tasks 1`
3. Run executors behind an egress firewall and block huggingface.co and github.com after setup, as the docs advise, so rubrics can't be fetched
4. Write .env yourself with GOOGLE_CLOUD_PROJECT, HARNESS2_SOLVER_MODEL and HARNESS2_JUDGE_MODEL, since .env.example isn't shipped, and never commit it
5. Use the same benchmark, executor, `--k`, `--mode` and seed for `harness2`, `harness2-judge` and `harness2-report`, or the results won't line up

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Cline or Harness²?

Cline scores 60.4 (C) on agent readiness against Harness²'s 41.6 (E), and leads in every scored category.

### Are Cline and Harness² open source?

Yes. Cline is open source (Apache-2.0). Harness² is open source (Apache-2.0. Bundled benchmark runners keep their upstream licences (Apache-2.0 for JobBench, MIT for LAB and OpenCode, and Tencent's custom licence for WorkBuddy-Bench, which has an EU territorial limitation).).


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-harness2.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-harness2.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "cline", "b": "harness2"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare cline harness2`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cline.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/harness2.json

## Other comparisons with Cline or Harness²

- [Agent Zero vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-cline.md)
- [Agent Zero vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-zero-vs-harness2.md)
- [Aider vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/aider-vs-cline.md)
- [Aider vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/aider-vs-harness2.md)
- [Amp vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amp-vs-cline.md)
- [Amp vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amp-vs-harness2.md)
- [Antigravity CLI vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/antigravity-cli-vs-cline.md)
- [Antigravity CLI vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/antigravity-cli-vs-harness2.md)
- [Claude Code vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-code-vs-cline.md)
- [Claude Code vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-code-vs-harness2.md)
- [Cline vs Cursor CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-cursor-cli.md)
- [Cline vs Devin](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-devin.md)
- [Cline vs Droid CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-droid-cli.md)
- [Cline vs Pi](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-earendil-pi.md)
- [Cline vs Gemini CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-gemini-cli.md)
- [Cline vs GitHub Copilot CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-github-copilot-cli.md)
- [Cline vs goose](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-goose.md)
- [Cline vs HarnessRouter](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-harnessrouter.md)
- [Cline vs Kilo Code CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-kilo-code-cli.md)
- [Cline vs Kiro CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-kiro-cli.md)
- [Cline vs Muse Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-muse-code.md)
- [Cline vs OpenAI Codex](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-openai-codex.md)
- [Cline vs OpenCode](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-opencode.md)
- [Cline vs OpenHands](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-openhands.md)
- [Cline vs Prime Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-prime-agent.md)
- [Cline vs Qwen Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-qwen-code.md)
- [Cline vs Mirror CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-reflection-mirror.md)
- [Cursor CLI vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cursor-cli-vs-harness2.md)
- [Devin vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/devin-vs-harness2.md)
- [Droid CLI vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/droid-cli-vs-harness2.md)
- [Pi vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/earendil-pi-vs-harness2.md)
- [Gemini CLI vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gemini-cli-vs-harness2.md)
- [GitHub Copilot CLI vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/github-copilot-cli-vs-harness2.md)
- [goose vs Harness²](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/goose-vs-harness2.md)
- [Harness² vs HarnessRouter](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-harnessrouter.md)
- [Harness² vs Kilo Code CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-kilo-code-cli.md)
- [Harness² vs Kiro CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-kiro-cli.md)
- [Harness² vs Muse Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-muse-code.md)
- [Harness² vs OpenAI Codex](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-openai-codex.md)
- [Harness² vs OpenCode](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-opencode.md)
- [Harness² vs OpenHands](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-openhands.md)
- [Harness² vs Prime Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-prime-agent.md)
- [Harness² vs Qwen Code](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-qwen-code.md)
- [Harness² vs Mirror CLI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/harness2-vs-reflection-mirror.md)
- [CLI Manager vs Cline](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cli-manager-vs-cline.md)
- [Cline vs Harness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-harness-autonomous.md)
- [Cline vs Paperclip](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-paperclip.md)
- [Cline vs Parallax](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cline-vs-parallax-agents.md)

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