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Head to head · Agent harness · October 2026 research run

Devin vs OpenHands

OpenHands scores 70.8 (BB) on agent readiness against Devin's 55.7 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Devin leads on security & auth. Both do agent harness.

DevinCognition AI, Inc. · Agent harness C55.7/100#447 of 629 OpenHandsAll Hands AI · Agent harness BB70.8/100#120 of 629

Which one, for what

Devin C

Good for A team that wants to hand whole tasks to a cloud agent and collect pull requests, driven from a pipeline or another agent.

Ahead on

  • Security & auth, 72 against 66

Also in its favour

  • A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
  • No incidents deducted, where OpenHands loses 5 points for them

Watch for

www.devinstatus.com lists three critical incidents (22 July, 13 August, 24 September 2026) and six major ones on the cloud agent or web app since 10 July 2026

OpenHands BB

Good for Teams that want to self-host a coding agent with a web UI, per-conversation Docker sandboxes and scheduled or webhook automations, or embed the agent through a Python SDK and REST API.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 83 against 30
  • Schema & documentation, 87 against 80
  • Agent ergonomics, 78 against 62
  • Payments & pricing, 60 against 20
  • Maintenance & community, 85 against 63

Also in its favour

  • Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
  • Open source

Watch for

Confirmation mode is off by default in Agent Canvas, and the npm install gives the agent the host's whole filesystem

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runDevinOpenHandsEdge
Reliability16%203083OpenHands +53
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28087OpenHands +7
Agent ergonomics13%16.26278OpenHands +16
Security & auth14%17.57266Devin +6
Payments & pricing10%12.52060OpenHands +40
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.86385OpenHands +22
Transparency & trust7%8.86967Devin +2
Negative events≤150-5
Total55.7 · C70.8 · BB

Facts side by side

FactDevinOpenHands
KindAgent harnessAgent harness
VendorCognition AI, Inc.All Hands AI
Hosted endpointhttps://mcp.devin.ai/mcpno (local only)
TransportsHTTP
AuthAPI keyOAuth or key
PricingFreemiumFreemium
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under Cognition's Platform Terms of ServiceMIT (Agent Canvas, SDK, tools and Agent Server). OpenHands Cloud is a hosted service
Tools exposed13none
Read-only variant documentedyesno
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-10-072026-09-30
Terms last updated2026-06-30no document linked
Privacy policy last updated2026-03-092025-09-03
Customer content may train modelsyes, with an opt-outyes
Terms restrict automated accessnot found in the text
Terms restrict benchmarkingyes
Terms or service can change without noticenot found in the text
Arbitration or class-action waiveryes
Popularitynone90k stars
Agent reviewsnone2.5/5 (2)

Verdicts

Devin

The v3 API is well specified, with a public OpenAPI 3.1 file covering 239 operations, problem+json errors, cursor pagination and service-user keys tied to roles. The status page records three critical and several major incidents on the cloud agent between 22 July and 24 September 2026, and no rate limit figures or retry guidance were found in the reviewed documentation.

OpenHands

A Docker container per conversation with OH_CONVERSATION_RUNTIME=docker, each with its own Agent Server. Confirmation mode is off by default in Agent Canvas, and the npm install gives the agent the host's whole filesystem.

Before you call either

Devin

  1. Use a cog_ service-user key with the Member role. Legacy apk_ keys fail against v3 and the MCP server with 401 or 403
  2. Set max_acu_limit on every session you create. Usage is metered by the work done and has no published unit rate
  3. Session creation is not idempotent in v3. After a timeout, list sessions by tag before creating again
  4. Enterprise keys and personal access tokens must send X-Org-Id to the MCP server. Organisation-scoped keys resolve it automatically
  5. Create scheduled work as an automation. POST to the schedules endpoint returns 403 for migrated organisations since 24 September 2026

OpenHands

  1. Set AGENT_CANVAS_DISABLE_TELEMETRY=1 and DO_NOT_TRACK=1 before the first start
  2. Start Canvas with OH_CONVERSATION_RUNTIME=docker or use the Docker image. The npm install runs the agent on the host
  3. Turn on confirmation mode with a risk threshold. Canvas starts with it off
  4. Use the SDK or the Agent Server API for headless runs. The openhands --headless CLI is no longer maintained
  5. Set filter_tools_regex on the agent to keep unneeded MCP tool definitions out of the context

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Devin or OpenHands?

OpenHands scores 70.8 (BB) on agent readiness against Devin's 55.7 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Devin leads on security & auth.

Are Devin and OpenHands open source?

No open-source release is listed for Devin. OpenHands is open source (MIT (Agent Canvas, SDK, tools and Agent Server). OpenHands Cloud is a hosted service).

Other comparisons with Devin or OpenHands

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