# GAIA vs PicoClaw

> GAIA scores 49.5 (D) to PicoClaw's 46.1 (D) for assistant proactive. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-picoclaw
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-picoclaw.md (~2,600 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-picoclaw.min.md (~680 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-picoclaw.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
- Updated: 2026-10-12

GAIA scores 49.5 (D) on agent readiness against PicoClaw's 46.1 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. PicoClaw leads on agent ergonomics and payments & pricing. Both do assistant proactive.

- GAIA: grade D, 49.5/100, rank #813 of 986. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/gaia.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/gaia.json
- PicoClaw: grade D, 46.1/100, rank #879 of 986. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/picoclaw.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/picoclaw.json
- Best AI personal assistants that act for one person: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/personal-assistants/index.md
- All 190 assistants comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/personal-assistants/index.md

## Which one, for what

### GAIA (D)

Good for: It suits one person who wants mail triage, meeting briefs, todos and scheduled workflows from one assistant reachable on WhatsApp, Telegram, Slack, Discord or iMessage, and who wants to read the source.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 67 against 54
- Maintenance & community, 78 against 22

Watch for: The default approval mode in the source is `always_allow`, commented as nothing gated, while the privacy policy and the 26 August release notes say destructive actions wait for approval.

### PicoClaw (D)

Good for: A person who wants a chat-app assistant on a cheap Linux board, an old Android phone or a home server, with reminders, web search and file memory, and who accepts running software its maker calls pre-production.

Ahead on:
- Agent ergonomics, 66 against 54
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 20

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

Watch for: No commit on main since 19 August 2026 and no release since v0.3.1 on 3 July 2026. An issue of 6 October calls the repository unmaintained, with no reply


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | GAIA | PicoClaw | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 67 | 54 | GAIA +13 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 51 | 51 | even |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 54 | 66 | PicoClaw +12 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 54 | 51 | GAIA +3 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 60 | PicoClaw +40 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 78 | 22 | GAIA +56 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 60 | 56 | GAIA +4 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -5 | -7 | |
| **Total** | | **49.5 · D** | **46.1 · D** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | GAIA | PicoClaw |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Platform | Agent harness |
| Vendor | The Experience Company | Sipeed |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | OAuth | None |
| Pricing | Paid | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | PolyForm-Noncommercial-1.0.0 | MIT |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-09-14 | 2026-07-03 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-08-14 | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-08-07 | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text |  |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes |  |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text |  |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes |  |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes |  |
| Popularity | 308 stars | 30k stars |

## Verdicts

**GAIA.** GAIA's source is public, so its approval gate, memory store and token handling can be read. Three approval modes and per-tool overrides exist, but the default mode in the source runs every action unasked, which the privacy policy and release notes do not say. Pro costs $30 a month and self-hosting is limited to noncommercial use.

**PicoClaw.** Self-hosted under the MIT licence, with 19 documented chat channels, scheduled and heartbeat tasks, and local file memory. The repository has had no commit since 19 August 2026 and no release since 3 July, and 15 CVEs are listed against it with no advisory or security policy from the project.

## Before you call either

### GAIA

1. Set Settings > Approvals to Always ask or Auto before connecting mail. The default in the source runs every action, including send and delete, without asking.
2. Expect no public API on the hosted service. The backend turns off its OpenAPI document in production, so reach GAIA through its apps, bots or CLI.
3. Check the plan before relying on the hosted service. The README and docs describe a Free plan, and the pricing page says GAIA is a paid product.
4. For self-hosting, prepare Docker, Node.js 20, a WorkOS account and a model key first, and confirm the use is noncommercial under the licence.
5. Add outside tools as MCP servers by URL on the Integrations page. GAIA asks before adding a server in every approval mode.

### PicoClaw

1. Set `allow_from` to the owner's user ID on every channel before starting the gateway. An empty list accepts messages from anyone
2. Set `tools.exec.allow_remote` to `false` unless chats must run shell commands. The shipped default is `true`, whatever docs/guides/configuration.md says
3. Set `isolation.enabled` to `true` on Linux (needs `bwrap`) or run in a container. The deny patterns do not inspect child processes
4. Use `PICOCLAW_KEY_PASSPHRASE` for credential encryption. One docs page names `PICOCLAW_CREDENTIAL_PASSPHRASE`, which the source does not read
5. Treat the README's ClawdChat line (read a remote skill file and follow it) as untrusted third-party instructions

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, GAIA or PicoClaw?

GAIA scores 49.5 (D) on agent readiness against PicoClaw's 46.1 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. PicoClaw leads on agent ergonomics and payments & pricing.

### Are GAIA and PicoClaw open source?

No open-source release is listed for GAIA. PicoClaw is open source (MIT).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with GAIA or PicoClaw

- [AstrBot vs GAIA](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-gaia.md)
- [AstrBot vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [CowAgent vs GAIA](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-gaia.md)
- [CowAgent vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [GAIA vs Gemini Spark](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-gemini-spark.md)
- [GAIA vs Grok Bot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-grok-bot.md)
- [GAIA vs Haven](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-haven.md)
- [GAIA vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [GAIA vs Instinct](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-instinct.md)
- [GAIA vs IronClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-ironclaw.md)
- [GAIA vs Leon](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-leon.md)
- [GAIA vs Lindy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-lindy.md)
- [GAIA vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-nanobot.md)
- [GAIA vs NanoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-nanoclaw.md)
- [GAIA vs Dots](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-openai-dots.md)
- [GAIA vs OpenClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-openclaw.md)
- [GAIA vs Poke](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-poke.md)
- [GAIA vs QwenPaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-qwenpaw.md)
- [GAIA vs ZeroClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-zeroclaw.md)
- [GAIA vs Zo Computer](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-zo-computer.md)
- [Gemini Spark vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gemini-spark-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Grok Bot vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grok-bot-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Haven vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/haven-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Instinct vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instinct-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [IronClaw vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Leon vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/leon-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Lindy vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lindy-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [nanobot vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [NanoClaw vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanoclaw-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Dots vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openai-dots-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [OpenClaw vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openclaw-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [PicoClaw vs Poke](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/picoclaw-vs-poke.md)
- [PicoClaw vs QwenPaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/picoclaw-vs-qwenpaw.md)
- [PicoClaw vs ZeroClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/picoclaw-vs-zeroclaw.md)
- [PicoClaw vs Zo Computer](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/picoclaw-vs-zo-computer.md)