# Droid CLI vs Qwen Code (slim)

> Qwen Code scores 72.4 (BB) to Droid CLI's 59.1 (C) for agent harnesses. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/droid-cli-vs-qwen-code.md (~2,650 tokens) · this version ~630 tokens · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/droid-cli-vs-qwen-code.json · canonical https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/droid-cli-vs-qwen-code
- Index: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt · API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json · Updated: 2026-10-09

Qwen Code scores 72.4 (BB) on agent readiness against Droid CLI's 59.1 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Droid CLI leads on security & auth. Both do agent harnesses.

- Droid CLI: C 59.1, rank #560 of 950 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/droid-cli.min.md
- Qwen Code: BB 72.4, rank #107 of 950 · https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/qwen-code.min.md
- Droid CLI, 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 Security & auth, 63 against 53.
- Qwen Code, good for Developers and CI jobs that want an open-source harness tied to no single model vendor, with run budgets and SDKs. Ahead on Reliability, 69 against 49; Schema & documentation, 91 against 79; Agent ergonomics, 85 against 72; Payments & pricing, 60 against 10; Maintenance & community, 88 against 79. Also Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better; Free to start without a card; Open source.

| Category | Droid CLI | Qwen Code |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability (16%) | 49 | 69 |
| Performance (10%) | pending | pending |
| Schema & documentation (13%) | 79 | 91 |
| Agent ergonomics (13%) | 72 | 85 |
| Security & auth (14%) | 63 | 53 |
| Payments & pricing (10%) | 10 | 60 |
| Task success (10%) | pending | pending |
| Maintenance & community (7%) | 79 | 88 |
| Transparency & trust (7%) | 64 | 63 |

| Fact (where they differ) | Droid CLI | Qwen Code |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Vendor | Factory | Alibaba (Qwen team) |
| Auth | OAuth or key | API key |
| Pricing | Paid | Free |
| 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 | Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-10-08 | 2026-10-05 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-07-14 | 2026-10-01 |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-08-20 | 2026-10-01 |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | yes | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | not found in the text |
| Popularity | 49 stars, 7.8k npm/wk | 28k stars, 105k npm/wk |