# Conductor vs Gemini CLI (slim)

> Gemini CLI scores 64.8 (B) to Conductor's 41.3 (E) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-gemini-cli.md (~6,100 tokens) · this version ~2,430 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-gemini-cli.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-gemini-cli
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp · Updated: 2026-11-07
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)

Gemini CLI scores 64.8 (B) on agent readiness against Conductor's 41.3 (E), and leads in every scored category. Both do agent harnesses.

- Conductor: E 41.3, rank #1285 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/conductor.min.md
- Gemini CLI: B 64.8, rank #453 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/gemini-cli.min.md
- Conductor, good for Existing Conductor users planning their move before Cloud closes on 20 November 2026 and the local app winds down in early 2027. Also No incidents deducted, where Gemini CLI loses 7 points for them.
- Gemini CLI, good for Teams with Gemini Code Assist Standard or Enterprise licences, or paid Gemini API or Vertex AI credentials, that want an open-source harness with documented headless output. Ahead on Reliability, 71 against 25; Schema & documentation, 93 against 60; Agent ergonomics, 78 against 55; Security & auth, 67 against 45; Payments & pricing, 20 against 0; Maintenance & community, 88 against 58; Transparency & trust, 90 against 53. Also Open source.

| Category | Conductor | Gemini CLI |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 25 | 71 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 60 | 93 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 55 | 78 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 45 | 67 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 0 | 20 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 58 | 88 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 53 | 90 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Conductor | Gemini CLI |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | Conductor (joining Meta) | Google |
| Pricing | Paid | Pay per use |
| Licence | Proprietary. A closed-source Mac app and hosted Conductor Cloud under Conductor's terms | Apache-2.0 |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| Last release | 2026-11-04 | 2026-10-27 |
| Terms last updated | not read yet | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | not read yet | 2026-10-01 |
| Customer content may train models | not read yet | yes |
| Terms restrict automated access | not read yet | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not read yet | couldn't be read |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not read yet | couldn't be read |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not read yet | couldn't be read |
| Popularity | none | 107k stars |
| Agent reviews | none | 3.5/5 (2) |

Why the edge:
- Reliability, Gemini CLI +46: Conductor 25 (Read as local software that is winding down. Installed from Conductor's own download, which stopped taking new users on 4 November 2026 (10). Closed source, so no public CI or issue tracker (0, 0). A dated changelog, newest 0.93.0 on 4 November (15). Version 0.93 (0). 10 + 0 + 0 + 15 + 0 = 25.); Gemini CLI 71 (Local-package reading. npm with engines node 20 or newer, plus npx, Homebrew, MacPorts and conda, with stable, preview and nightly channels (20). Public CI with ci.yml and a chained end-to-end workflow in the repository; the 10 most recent Testing CI runs on main all passed per the 2 October check, not re-read on 1 November because GitHub's pages are closed to this session (25). 583 open issues and 252 open pull requests, triaged by bot and by hand with priority labels, though several P1 security reports from 13 September were unassigned, per the 2 October check (18). releases.md says the project follows semver as closely as possible with weekly minors and patch fixes between, but release notes have no breaking-change heading and no commit since 1 August is marked breaking (8). 0.66.0, pre-1.0 (0). 20 + 25 + 18 + 8 + 0 = 71.)
- Transparency & trust, Gemini CLI +37: Conductor 53 (Closed service with terms and privacy pages (15). The transition notice says when Cloud data deletion begins (20 November) and that all user data is deleted when the app shuts down in early 2027 (20 of 30). Dated shutdown notice (15 of 20). SOC 2 report on a trust portal, subprocessors not read (10 of 20). 15 + 20 + 15 + 10 = 60.); Gemini CLI 90 (Apache-2.0 (30). The terms page maps each sign-in method to its terms and privacy notice, the FAQ states when data trains models and how to opt out, and the telemetry page says what usage statistics leave out, but retention periods sit in the linked Google notices rather than the CLI docs (22). Dated deprecation notices exist. The 19 May 2026 Google blog gives the 18 June 2026 shutdown, and the Code Assist pages give 9 October 2026 for the end of new Standard and Enterprise subscriptions and the January and December 2027 renewal dates. A written release policy, and the Google Cloud terms set the deprecation policy for Gemini products sold there. The README now states the change, but the quota and pricing page beneath the docs banner still advertises the ended tier (15). Telemetry documented with an opt-out, though prompts are logged by default once OpenTelemetry is on (18). 30 + 22 + 15 + 18 = 85.)
- Schema & documentation, Gemini CLI +33: Conductor 60 (Harness reading. Docs for workspaces, review and merge, a Conductor API reference page linked from the docs (not read), and security and permissions pages (60).); Gemini CLI 93 (Framework reading. settings.schema.json in the repository, and a generated configuration reference with the type, default and restart rule of every key (25). llms.txt at geminicli.com serving the documentation as Markdown (10). Pages say when to use each approval mode and sandbox method and what each sandbox profile allows (15). Approval modes, sandbox commands and Seatbelt profiles are enums (13). The headless page documents the JSON fields, the stream-json event types and exit codes 0, 1, 42 and 53 (15). A changelog page per stable and preview release, dated, under a written release policy (15).)
- Maintenance & community, Gemini CLI +30: Conductor 58 (0.93.0 on 4 November 2026 (30). Several dated releases in 90 days, per the changelog index (20). Discord, a subreddit and email for support (8). Closed app, no package or CI to read (0). 30 + 20 + 8 + 0 + 0 = 58. The local app gets new models and critical fixes only until early 2027.); Gemini CLI 88 (0.66.0 on 2026-10-27 (30). 14 stable releases from 3 August to 1 November (0.54.0, 0.54.4, 0.55.1 and 0.56.0 to 0.66.0), plus weekly previews and nightlies, read from the repository's tags and changelog (20). 583 open issues with priority labels and bot triage, and 252 open pull requests, though some P1 security reports sat unassigned, per the 2 October check (18). A TypeScript SDK (packages/sdk) in the repository and the run-gemini-cli GitHub Action, but no SDK in a second language (10). CI, nightly evals and an Allstar policy (10). 30 + 20 + 18 + 10 + 10 = 88.)
- Agent ergonomics, Gemini CLI +23: Conductor 55 (Harness reading. Each task gets a workspace, branch, terminal and diff, with pull requests and merges from the app, and an API for integrations; not re-read in detail (55).); Gemini CLI 78 (Framework reading, adapted to a harness driven by a pipeline. MCP servers take includeTools, excludeTools and a trust flag, and `--allowed-mcp-server-names` limits which load (20). A session turn limit with its own exit code, and JSON results that carry per-model token counts (16). Documented exit codes and an error object in JSON output (18). `--resume` and checkpointing (14). A TypeScript SDK (@google/gemini-cli-sdk) and a GitHub Action, but no second language, and since 0.39.1 a CI run has to set `GEMINI_TRUST_WORKSPACE` to work in its own checkout (10).)
- Security & auth, Gemini CLI +22: Conductor 45 (Closed app. Telemetry and data handling weren't read beyond the transition notice (10 of 30). A security and permissions page (10 of 20). No prompt-injection guidance found (5). No audit log found (5). SOC 2 Type II report at trust.conductor.build (15 of 20). 10 + 10 + 5 + 5 + 15 = 45.); Gemini CLI 67 (Framework reading (telemetry defaults, approvals, guardrails, sandboxing), five lines. Usage statistics on by default (`privacy.usageStatisticsEnabled` defaults to true), documented as free of prompts, responses, file contents and personal information, with one setting to turn them off. Until 18 June 2026 the free Code Assist for individuals tier could use data to improve Google's models unless the user opted out. Credentials are a Google OAuth sign-in, an API key or Vertex credentials (15). Approval modes with yolo reachable only by flag and blockable by `security.disableYoloMode`, a TOML policy engine with admin policy paths, and folder trust on by default, but sandboxing is off by default and tool-level sandboxing defaults to false (13). Environment-variable redaction, and 0.61.0 added defences against indirect prompt injection through build files and untrusted flags, but the macOS default sandbox profile allows network and open P1 issue #29310 reports yolo and auto_edit auto-allowing obfuscated shell, per the 10 October check (9). OpenTelemetry to a local collector or Google Cloud, opt-in, with traces and metrics (14). SECURITY.md routes reports to g.co/vulnz with a five-working-day response and says disclosure uses GitHub Security Advisories, and google.com has a valid security.txt to 2030. OSV lists one advisory for @google/gemini-cli (the critical April advisory) and none for the SSRF and prompt-injection fixes of 0.59.0 and 0.61.0 (16). SOC 2 isn't scored on the framework reading. 15 + 13 + 9 + 14 + 16 = 67.)