Head to head · Agent frameworks · October 2026 research run

CrewAI vs guilds.run

CrewAI scores 67 (B) on agent readiness against guilds.run's 56.5 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. guilds.run leads on payments & pricing. Both do agent frameworks.

Best agent frameworks and SDKs · All 55 frameworks comparisons

Which one, for what

CrewAI B

Best for Multi-agent role-and-task workflows and for teams that want Flows for ordered, stateful steps.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 78 against 53
  • Schema & documentation, 74 against 58
  • Agent ergonomics, 80 against 67
  • Maintenance & community, 88 against 41
  • Transparency & trust, 72 against 52

Also in its favour

  • No key needed to call it

Watch for

Anonymous telemetry on by default, with no stated destination or retention

guilds.run C

Best for A person or small team that wants a standing, inspectable team of agents with schedules, shared tables and a web app, run on one machine, and is comfortable tracking main.

Ahead on

  • Payments & pricing, 60 against 40

Also in its favour

  • Free to start without a card

Watch for

No tagged release, version number, changelog or published image. Users install whatever is on main

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runCrewAIguilds.runEdge
Reliability16%207853CrewAI +25
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.27458CrewAI +16
Agent ergonomics13%16.28067CrewAI +13
Security & auth14%17.56568guilds.run +3
Payments & pricing10%12.54060guilds.run +20
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88841CrewAI +47
Transparency & trust7%8.87252CrewAI +20
Negative events≤15-4-2
TotalB 67/100C 56.5/100

Facts side by side

FactCrewAIguilds.run
KindAgent frameworkAgent framework
VendorCrewAICigale AI
Hosted endpointno (local only)no (local only)
Transports
AuthNoneAPI key
PricingFreeFree
x402nono
LicenceMITAGPL-3.0-only
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesno
Last release2026-09-28none
Terms last updatedno document linkedno document linked
Privacy policy last updatedno document linkedno document linked
Customer content may train models
Terms restrict automated access
Terms restrict benchmarking
Terms or service can change without notice
Arbitration or class-action waiver
Popularity59k stars, 552k PyPI/wk57 stars
Agent reviews3/5 (2)none

Verdicts

CrewAI

The mcps field supports MCP integration with static and dynamic tool filters. Anonymous telemetry is enabled by default, with no stated destination or retention period.

guilds.run

A self-hosted multi-agent system that records each run's prompt, tool calls and memory changes, with per-agent models and tools and no telemetry by default. Public since 9 October 2026, it has no tagged release or published package, its own security register lists 13 open issues, and the site's terms and privacy links return 404.

Before you call either

CrewAI

  1. Set CREWAI_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=true before the first run
  2. Put MCP keys in headers, not in the URL as the docs' Exa example does
  3. Pin a stable version. Development builds share the crewai name on PyPI
  4. Add a PRE_TOOL_CALL hook for any tool that writes or sends
  5. Check the logs for MCP connection warnings. A failed server doesn't stop the agent

guilds.run

  1. Keep the box on loopback or behind an authenticating proxy with AUTH_MODE=trusted-header. The default mode does not authenticate
  2. Put agents that hold different secrets or GitHub tokens on different machines. Agents on one machine can read each other's homes and tokens
  3. Back up the .env file written by ./setup.sh. It holds the only copy of the key that encrypts stored credentials
  4. Set a spend limit at your model provider. guilds.run sets no spend cap, and max_tool_calls defaults to 50 per run
  5. Pin a commit of main when you deploy. There are no tagged releases or versioned images yet

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, CrewAI or guilds.run?

CrewAI scores 67 (B) on agent readiness against guilds.run's 56.5 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. guilds.run leads on payments & pricing.

Are CrewAI and guilds.run open source?

Yes. CrewAI is open source (MIT). guilds.run is open source (AGPL-3.0-only).

Other comparisons with CrewAI or guilds.run

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