# Droid CLI vs mini-swe-agent

> Droid CLI scores 59.1 (C) to mini-swe-agent's 56.7 (C) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-18

Droid CLI scores 59.1 (C) on agent readiness against mini-swe-agent's 56.7 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. mini-swe-agent leads on reliability and payments & pricing. Both do agent harnesses.

- Droid CLI: grade C, 59.1/100, rank #619 of 1146. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/droid-cli.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/droid-cli.json
- mini-swe-agent: grade C, 56.7/100, rank #698 of 1146. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/mini-swe-agent.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/mini-swe-agent.json
- Best agent harnesses and coding agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/agent-harnesses/index.md
- All 713 harnesses comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent-harnesses/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Droid CLI (C)

Good for: Teams that want a terminal coding agent with tiered autonomy, command rules and an optional sandbox, and that will pay for a Factory plan.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 79 against 58
- Security & auth, 63 against 56
- Maintenance & community, 79 against 49
- Transparency & trust, 64 against 51

Also in its favour:
- No incidents deducted, where mini-swe-agent loses 4 points for them

Watch for: No free tier or trial was found. Plans start at $20 a month and included usage is stated only as rolling rate limits without numbers

### mini-swe-agent (C)

Good for: Benchmark runs, research baselines and RL or fine-tuning pipelines that want a minimal, readable agent with a linear trajectory, and for people who want to read every line of their harness.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 70 against 49
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 10

Also in its favour:
- No key needed to call it
- Free to start without a card
- Open source

Watch for: The default local environment runs commands on the host with no isolation and the full host environment


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Droid CLI | mini-swe-agent | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 49 | 70 | mini-swe-agent +21 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 79 | 58 | Droid CLI +21 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 72 | 69 | Droid CLI +3 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 63 | 56 | Droid CLI +7 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 10 | 60 | mini-swe-agent +50 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 79 | 49 | Droid CLI +30 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 64 | 51 | Droid CLI +13 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | -4 | |
| **Total** | | **59.1 · C** | **56.7 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Droid CLI | mini-swe-agent |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Factory | SWE-bench team (Princeton and Stanford) |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | OAuth or key | None |
| Pricing | Paid | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary, under Factory's Terms and Conditions. The `droid` npm package is marked `UNLICENSED` and the public repository holds documentation only. The Python SDK is Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-10-08 | 2026-07-23 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-07-14 | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-08-20 | 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 | yes |  |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text |  |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes |  |
| Popularity | 49 stars, 7.8k npm/wk | 8.6k stars, 4.4M PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 3/5 (4) |

## Verdicts

**Droid CLI.** `droid exec` is read-only unless `--auto` raises the autonomy level, with command rules, an optional kernel-enforced sandbox, JSON output and documented exit codes. No free tier, status page or security.txt was found, the source is closed, and usage metrics go to Factory by default.

**mini-swe-agent.** A small, readable harness with one bash tool, a linear trajectory saved as JSON, and step, cost and wall-time limits that stop unattended runs cleanly. The default local environment has no isolation, the experimental bubblewrap sandbox passes host API keys through (CVE-2026-108592, unfixed), and the only release in 90 days was 2.4.6 on 23 July 2026.

## Before you call either

### Droid CLI

1. Set `FACTORY_API_KEY` (starts `fk-`) from the API keys page in Factory settings for headless runs. Interactive use signs in through a browser
2. Start with `droid exec` and no flags for analysis. Add `--auto low` for edits and `--auto medium` for installs, tests and local commits
3. Use `--output-format json` and read `is_error`, `num_turns` and `session_id`. Treat a non-zero exit code as failure
4. Set `sandbox.enabled` to true before running on untrusted code. In `droid exec` a sandbox violation is denied without a prompt
5. Pin the version in CI with `npm install -g droid@<version>`, or set `FACTORY_DROID_AUTO_UPDATE_ENABLED=false` on standalone installs, which update themselves

### mini-swe-agent

1. Run with `-y --exit-immediately` for unattended use. Without `--exit-immediately` it waits for input when the agent finishes
2. Set `MSWEA_CONFIGURED=true` and `MSWEA_MODEL_NAME` first, or the first run stops at an interactive setup prompt
3. Read `info.exit_status` in the `-o` trajectory file. A run that hits its limits still exits normally
4. For untrusted repositories use `-c mini.yaml -c environment.environment_class=docker -c environment.image=<image>`. The local and bubblewrap environments both expose host variables
5. Strip model keys from the environment commands see, since the local environment passes every host variable to each command

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Droid CLI or mini-swe-agent?

Droid CLI scores 59.1 (C) on agent readiness against mini-swe-agent's 56.7 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. mini-swe-agent leads on reliability and payments & pricing.

### Are Droid CLI and mini-swe-agent open source?

No open-source release is listed for Droid CLI. mini-swe-agent is open source (MIT).


## For agents

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

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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