# CowAgent vs LearnHarness

> LearnHarness and CowAgent score within a point of each other for assistants that remember you, 59.3 and 58.7 out of 100. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-learnharness
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-learnharness.md (~3,950 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-learnharness.min.md (~630 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-learnharness.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-10-30

LearnHarness and CowAgent score within a point of each other on agent readiness, 59.3 (C) and 58.7 (C). CowAgent leads on reliability and maintenance & community. Both do assistants that remember you.

- CowAgent: grade C, 58.7/100, rank #671 of 1239. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/cowagent.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/cowagent.json
- LearnHarness: grade C, 59.3/100, rank #648 of 1239. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/learnharness.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/learnharness.json
- Best AI personal assistants that act for one person: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/personal-assistants/index.md
- All 1196 assistants comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/personal-assistants/index.md

## Which one, for what

### CowAgent (C)

Good for: One technical owner who wants an assistant on WeChat, Feishu, DingTalk, Telegram, Slack or Discord with memory in local files and a choice of Chinese and Western model providers.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 84 against 56
- Maintenance & community, 83 against 71

Watch for: Source and Docker installs default to full-access, and no mode asks the owner before a shell command, a file send or an MCP call

### LearnHarness (C)

Good for: A tutor for one learner that keeps a local record of sessions and a graph of propositions and reasoning chains.

Ahead on:
- Security & auth, 52 against 43
- Transparency & trust, 60 against 47

Also in its favour:
- No key needed to call it
- No incidents deducted, where CowAgent loses 5 points for them

Watch for: The read, ls, find and grep tools resolve against the home directory with no allow list, and their output goes to the model provider


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | CowAgent | LearnHarness | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 84 | 56 | CowAgent +28 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 67 | 63 | CowAgent +4 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 59 | 60 | LearnHarness +1 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 43 | 52 | LearnHarness +9 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 60 | even |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 83 | 71 | CowAgent +12 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 47 | 60 | LearnHarness +13 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -5 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **58.7 · C** | **59.3 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | CowAgent | LearnHarness |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | zhayujie | Amos Blomqvist |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | HTTP |  |
| Auth | OAuth or key | None |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | AGPL-3.0-only |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-09-30 | 2026-10-29 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | 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 | 47k stars | 4.2k stars |

## Verdicts

**CowAgent.** MIT software with seven releases in 90 days, memory kept as plain files in the owner's workspace and three per-session permission modes. Source and Docker installs default to full-access, no action asks for approval, and an open report of 31 July 2026 says group members could reach the owner's files through the bot.

**LearnHarness.** The in-app agent reads files but cannot change them or run commands, and a bundled skill gives other agents a documented read-only view of sessions and the knowledge graph. The project is 14 days old at 0.4.0, its file reads reach the whole home directory without approval, and it has no security policy.

## Before you call either

### CowAgent

1. Set `agent_permission_mode` to `workspace-write` or `read-only` before connecting any channel. Source and Docker installs default to `full-access`
2. Keep the bot out of group chats that include other people. Any member who mentions it reaches the same tools as the owner
3. Set `web_password` before changing `web_host` to `0.0.0.0`. The password is empty by default
4. Set `external_api_token` to enable `POST /v1/chat/completions`, and send `conversation_id` to keep one session. The `model` field does not select a model
5. Run it in a container for a hard boundary. The docs and the source both say the permission modes are not isolation

### LearnHarness

1. Use the bundled skill (`skills/learnharness/SKILL.md`) to read a learner's record. It needs Python 3.10 or later and writes nothing
2. Pass `--format json` before the subcommand, for example `python3 -B scripts/graph.py --format json propositions`
3. Treat stored answer keys and teacher prose as model-authored. A proposition in the graph is not evidence the learner understood it
4. Do not read `auth.json`, which sits one folder above the data folder and holds provider keys in plain text
5. Close the app or re-read when a stable snapshot matters. The readers do not lock files while the app writes

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, CowAgent or LearnHarness?

LearnHarness and CowAgent score within a point of each other on agent readiness, 59.3 (C) and 58.7 (C). CowAgent leads on reliability and maintenance & community.

### Are CowAgent and LearnHarness open source?

Yes. CowAgent is open source (MIT). LearnHarness is open source (AGPL-3.0-only).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with CowAgent or LearnHarness

- [asaply vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asaply-vs-cowagent.md)
- [Asmi vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asmi-vs-cowagent.md)
- [Boba vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boba-vs-cowagent.md)
- [Brea vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/brea-vs-cowagent.md)
- [CowAgent vs Del](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-del.md)
- [CowAgent vs HireAlpha](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-hirealpha.md)
- [CowAgent vs OpenInstinct](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-openinstinct.md)
- [CowAgent vs Orbits](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-orbits.md)
- [CowAgent vs Orchid](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-orchid-ai.md)
- [CowAgent vs szn](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-szn.md)
- [CowAgent vs Tab](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-tab-bot.md)
- [CowAgent vs Zapia](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-zapia.md)
- [AstrBot vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-cowagent.md)
- [Boski vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boski-vs-cowagent.md)
- [Caddy vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/caddy-app-vs-cowagent.md)
- [Claude Duet vs CowAgent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-duet-vs-cowagent.md)
- [CowAgent vs folk](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-folk-nozomio.md)
- [CowAgent vs GAIA](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-gaia.md)
- [CowAgent vs Gemini Spark](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-gemini-spark.md)
- [CowAgent vs Grok Bot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-grok-bot.md)
- [CowAgent vs Haven](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-haven.md)
- [CowAgent vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [CowAgent vs Instinct](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-instinct.md)
- [CowAgent vs IronClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-ironclaw.md)
- [CowAgent vs Leon](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-leon.md)
- [CowAgent vs Lindy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-lindy.md)
- [CowAgent vs Lobby](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-lobby-os.md)
- [CowAgent vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-nanobot.md)
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- [CowAgent vs Dots](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-openai-dots.md)
- [CowAgent vs OpenClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-openclaw.md)
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Query this catalogue directly over MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (Streamable HTTP, no key). How: https://www.anchorterminal.com/agents/#mcp