# Conductor vs GitHub Copilot CLI (slim)

> GitHub Copilot CLI scores 56 (C) 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-github-copilot-cli.md (~6,400 tokens) · this version ~2,580 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-github-copilot-cli.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/conductor-vs-github-copilot-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)

GitHub Copilot CLI scores 56 (C) 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
- GitHub Copilot CLI: C 56, rank #844 of 1486 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/github-copilot-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 GitHub Copilot CLI loses 8 points for them.
- GitHub Copilot CLI, good for Developers and teams already on GitHub and Copilot who want an agent that knows their repositories and issues, and a cloud agent that opens pull requests. Ahead on Reliability, 55 against 25; Schema & documentation, 72 against 60; Agent ergonomics, 72 against 55; Security & auth, 65 against 45; Payments & pricing, 40 against 0; Maintenance & community, 77 against 58; Transparency & trust, 74 against 53. Also Free to start without a card.

| Category | Conductor | GitHub Copilot CLI |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 25 | 55 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 60 | 72 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 55 | 72 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 45 | 65 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 0 | 40 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 58 | 77 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 53 | 74 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Conductor | GitHub Copilot CLI |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | Conductor (joining Meta) | GitHub |
| Pricing | Paid | Freemium |
| Licence | Proprietary. A closed-source Mac app and hosted Conductor Cloud under Conductor's terms | Proprietary, under the licence in the repository's `LICENSE.md`. Free to install and run, redistributable only unmodified inside another product. The repository holds the README, changelog and install script, not the source |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| Last release | 2026-11-04 | 2026-10-27 |
| Terms last updated | not read yet | 2026-04-27 |
| Privacy policy last updated | not read yet | 2026-04-27 |
| Customer content may train models | not read yet | yes, with an opt-out |
| Terms restrict automated access | not read yet | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not read yet | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not read yet | not found in the text |
| Popularity | none | 11k stars |
| Agent reviews | none | 2.5/5 (2) |

Why the edge:
- Payments & pricing, GitHub Copilot CLI +40: Conductor 0 (No new sign-ups since 4 November, free users can't upgrade, and no price is shown. No protocol, no published price, no open free tier, no onboarding (0).); GitHub Copilot CLI 40 (Harness reading of the published rubric. No payment protocol (0). Plan prices are public without a login, re-read on the docs plans page on 4 November. Pro $10, Pro+ $39, Max $100 a month, Business $19 and Enterprise $39 a seat, with usage past an organisation's pool at $0.01 per AI credit (20). Copilot Free includes the CLI with an allowance of AI credits and auto model selection only, and no card per the 2 October check (20). A person signs in to GitHub or creates the token (0). 0+20+20+0 = 40.)
- Reliability, GitHub Copilot CLI +30: 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.); GitHub Copilot CLI 55 (Local-package reading. npm, Homebrew, WinGet and an install script for Linux, macOS and Windows, with PowerShell 6 or newer named for Windows, though the npm package declares no engines, per the 17 October check (20). No public CI or test suite, since the source isn't published, and the repository holds only the README, licence, changelog, install script and a container folder, per a clone on 4 November (0). About 1,900 open issues and 28 open pull requests, labelled by area and platform with a triage label and no-response automation, per the 1 October check, not re-read on 4 November (12). A dated changelog for every release, with breaking changes marked BREAKING, though they ship in 1.0.x patch versions, and 1.0.103 removed the `--no-remote` flag without the label (8). 1.0 since March 2026, at 1.0.105 on 27 October per the changelog and tag (15). Same reading as Claude Code and Cursor CLI, which are also closed source. 20+0+12+8+15 = 55.)
- Transparency & trust, GitHub Copilot CLI +21: 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.); GitHub Copilot CLI 74 (Proprietary licence with clear terms for running and redistributing (15). The data-use page dates the training change (24 April 2026), says which plans it covers and how to opt out, and says Business and Enterprise data isn't used, re-read on 4 November, but we didn't find retention periods for CLI sessions (18). On 15 October 2026 GitHub gave dated notice that Claude Opus 4.8, Claude Opus 5 and GPT-5.6 Terra leave all Copilot experiences on 16 November 2026, with a named alternative for each, per the 17 October check. Breaking changes are mostly marked in a dated changelog. There's no written deprecation policy or notice period, the same reading as openai-codex and gemini-cli (15). The command reference now lists `--disable-client-telemetry`, added in 1.0.100 on 19 October, so client telemetry is disclosed with an opt-out, but no page says what it sends. OpenTelemetry export is documented and opt-in (12). 15+18+15+12 = 60.)
- Security & auth, GitHub Copilot CLI +20: 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.); GitHub Copilot CLI 65 (Framework reading (telemetry defaults, approvals, guardrails, sandboxing), five lines. Since 1.0.100 (19 October 2026) `--disable-client-telemetry` turns off the telemetry the CLI sends, which the command reference says doesn't affect server-side telemetry. Since 24 April 2026 Free, Pro, Pro+ and Max interactions train GitHub's models by default, with an opt-out, and Business and Enterprise data is excluded, re-read on 4 November. A fine-grained token with only the Copilot Requests permission works for CI (16). Asks before the first use of each modifying tool, deny rules that beat `--allow-all-tools`, URL and path permissions, trusted directories and enterprise managed settings. Local sandboxing is generally available since 1.0.93 (7 October 2026) and off by default, enterprises can require it fail-closed, and since 1.0.100 the sandbox allows local network access by default. Assisted Permissions, where a model approves requests it judges safe, left experimental mode in 1.0.104. The CLI still can't enforce two organisation MCP policies (17). The sandbox proxy filters hosts, sandboxed shells withhold `GITHUB_TOKEN` since 1.0.92, and content exclusion applies, but we found no prompt-injection guidance for the CLI (9). OpenTelemetry export with GenAI spans, opt-in, with enterprise capture controls since 12 October, and session logs (13). Two advisories with CVEs in 2026 and none since on OSV, re-read on 4 November, but no SECURITY.md in the repository and an expired security.txt on github.com per the 26 September check, which the proxy still refuses. We didn't check GitHub's bug bounty (10). SOC 2 isn't scored on the framework reading. 16+17+9+13+10 = 65.)
- Maintenance & community, GitHub Copilot CLI +19: 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.); GitHub Copilot CLI 77 (1.0.105 on 27 October 2026 per the changelog and its tag, 8 days before this check. Tags 1.0.106-1 to 1.0.106-8 (30 October) are pre-releases with no changelog entry and don't count (30). 25 dated releases from 1.0.79 (10 August) to 1.0.105 (27 October) in the 90 days from 6 August (20). Issues are labelled and triaged, with automation for stale and unanswered reports, though about 1,900 stay open, per the 1 October check (14). An SDK the changelog keeps updating (session APIs, MCP management, OAuth tokens), languages unchecked (10). Closed source and a bundled npm build, so no CI or dependency health to read (3). 30+20+14+10+3 = 77.)
- Agent ergonomics, GitHub Copilot CLI +17: 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).); GitHub Copilot CLI 72 (Framework reading, adapted to a harness driven by a pipeline. `--available-tools` and `--excluded-tools` shape the tool list and `--deny-tool` removes tools, and MCP tool discovery recovers without a restart (20). `--max-autopilot-continues` caps autopilot, and a turn timeout applies to background work in `-p` (15). JSON output, and a 2026 release replaced a misleading auth error with the real cause (12). `--resume` and `--continue`, and permission prompts survive a resumed session (15). An SDK exists, per the changelog, but we didn't check its languages, and a headless run needs explicit allow flags to do anything (10).)