# Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs Strands Agents

> Strands Agents scores 80 (A) to Agent Development Kit's 68.7 (B) for agent frameworks. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-strands-agents
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-strands-agents.md (~3,750 tokens)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (the key docs and every listing in one file, at most 16 MB, about 4 million tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- DNS: dig +short TXT <slug>.grade.anchorterminal.com (the grade as a DNS TXT record, for a sandbox with no HTTP where names still resolve; also top., best.<category>. and <a>.vs.<b>. under the zone, and the same under grade.letme.dev)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Strands Agents scores 80 (A) on agent readiness against Agent Development Kit (ADK)'s 68.7 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Both do agent frameworks.

- Agent Development Kit (ADK): grade B, 68.7/100, rank #272 of 1486. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/google-adk.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/google-adk.json
- Strands Agents: grade A, 80/100, rank #15 of 1486. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/strands-agents.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/strands-agents.json
- Best agent frameworks and SDKs: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/frameworks/index.md
- All 171 frameworks comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/frameworks/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Agent Development Kit (ADK) (B)

Good for: Teams on Google Cloud or working outside Python, and for anyone who wants approval, guardrail callbacks and evaluation in one framework.

Watch for: Six CVEs in 2026, three of them critical, one in tool confirmation itself

### Strands Agents (A)

Good for: Python or TypeScript teams, especially on AWS, who want a model-driven loop with MCP, multi-agent patterns and approval gates.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 87 against 80
- Schema & documentation, 95 against 87
- Agent ergonomics, 87 against 80

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better

Watch for: Three advisories in October 2026 on A2A session sharing and world-readable default session files, fixed in 1.43.0 and 1.48.0


## Why the edge

### Schema & documentation: Strands Agents +8

- Agent Development Kit (ADK) (87): An API reference on adk.dev (25). llms.txt with about 250 entries and Markdown versions of each page (10). The docs explain the agent types and when to use workflow agents, but say little about when not to use ADK (15). Tools are typed functions, and McpToolset keeps the server's schemas (12). Examples throughout, but the MCP page has no error handling section and we found no exception reference (10). Dated changelog and release notes (15).
- Strands Agents (95): Framework reading. Typed Python and TypeScript APIs with a reference for each (25). llms.txt with a Markdown twin of every page (10). The llms.txt and docs say when to use Strands over a hand-written loop and when to take the harness rather than the SDK (18). Tools are typed from decorated functions or Zod schemas (15). Python and TypeScript examples on every page, stop reasons and hook events documented, with no catalogue of exceptions (12). Versioning page and tagged releases per package (15). 25+10+18+15+12+15 = 95.

### Reliability: Strands Agents +7

- Agent Development Kit (ADK) (80): Official packages on PyPI (Requires-Python >=3.11 since 2.12.0, constraint files for 3.11 to 3.15) and npm (20). The continuous-integration workflow passes on main, per the 1 October check, not re-read on 1 November (25). 300 open issues and 261 open pull requests, per the 1 October check, not re-read on 1 November (12). The changelog calls out breaking changes, but they keep shipping in minor releases of a post-1.0 package (2.6.0 on 2026-07-29 and 2.7.0 on 2026-08-13), 2.12.0 on 2026-10-13 dropped Python 3.10 with no line in its changelog, and 2.8.0 reverted an A2A guard that had broken every tool confirmation. On 8 October the changelog relabelled the 2.11.0 dev UI config change a bug fix and the 2.9.0 resumption changes behaviour changes. 2.13.0 (22 October) marks one more breaking change, the telemetry schema default, in a minor release (8). 2.12.0, past 1.0 (15).
- Strands Agents (87): Local-package reading. Official PyPI and npm packages with Python 3.10 and Node 22 stated (20). A public CI workflow runs lint, type checks, unit and integration tests for each package on pull requests to main, plus security-audit workflows, and the latest Python, TypeScript, harness and MCP runs on main passed on 6 November (25). 664 open issues and 1,151 open issues and pull requests on 6 November, with 545 issues opened in the 90 days to 3 November. Of the 50 newest, 12 had a comment and 15 were closed, and 9 of the 40 newest open items carry a bug label. An issue-responder workflow runs on new issues (12). A written semantic versioning policy, experimental APIs kept apart, and deprecations removed only at a major (15). 1.0 since 15 July 2025 (15). 20+25+12+15+15 = 87.

### Agent ergonomics: Strands Agents +7

- Agent Development Kit (ADK) (80): An agent with one MCP server is about 15 lines with the built-in McpToolset, and tool_filter limits which tools load, with no dynamic filtering or deferred loading that we saw (20). RunConfig caps model calls per run, and the context compression page documents token-based and sliding-window compaction through EventsCompactionConfig, plus context caching (20). No exception reference or MCP error handling documented (5). Invocations are resumable, model calls take retry options, and 2.11.0 adds an abort_signal for graceful cancellation (20). An agent needs a name, a model and an instruction, in Python, TypeScript, Go, Java or Kotlin (15).
- Strands Agents (87): Framework reading. An MCPClient is passed straight to the agent in a few lines and its lifecycle is managed, with tool filtering per client (22). Conversation managers, turn limits, token budgets and cancellation bound each run (20). Stop reasons and typed events, and hooks that can retry a model or tool call (16). Retry strategies, session managers that persist and resume a conversation, and interrupts that resume where they paused (17). Two official languages, but the default provider is Bedrock, which needs AWS credentials and model access (12). 22+20+16+17+12 = 87.

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Agent Development Kit (ADK) | Strands Agents | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 80 | 87 | Strands Agents +7 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 87 | 95 | Strands Agents +8 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 80 | 87 | Strands Agents +7 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 92 | 89 | Agent Development Kit (ADK) +3 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 60 | even |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 90 | 87 | Agent Development Kit (ADK) +3 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 69 | 72 | Strands Agents +3 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -12 | -4 | |
| **Total** | | **68.7 · B** | **80 · A** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Agent Development Kit (ADK) | Strands Agents |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent framework | Agent framework |
| Vendor | Google | Amazon Web Services |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | None | None |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-23 | 2026-11-04 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-10-01 | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models | yes | not read yet |
| Popularity | 22k stars | 9.1k stars, 698k npm/wk, 8.9M PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | 3/5 (8) | none |

## How the scores have moved

### Agent Development Kit (ADK)

- -5.0 on 1 November 2026 (BB to B): negative event
- +0.1 on 27 October 2026: checklist
- -1.1 on 17 October 2026: new evidence, negative event

### Strands Agents

No score change since it was listed.

## Verdicts

**Agent Development Kit (ADK).** Python, TypeScript, Go, Java and Kotlin, with tool confirmation and context compaction built in. Google has published six CVEs against ADK in 2026, three of them critical, one in tool confirmation itself, and minor 2.x releases keep carrying breaking changes.

**Strands Agents.** An Apache-2.0 agent SDK for Python and TypeScript with a managed MCP client, multi-agent patterns, interrupts and Cedar policies for approval, opt-in OpenTelemetry and no usage analytics. Bedrock is the default model, the default sandbox is the local host, and three session-isolation advisories were fixed in October 2026.

## Before you call either

### Agent Development Kit (ADK)

1. Run Python 2.7.0 or later and Java 1.13.0 or later, which fix the adk web code-injection CVE, the tool-confirmation forgery and the Java dev server's cross-origin flaw
2. Always pass tool_filter to McpToolset
3. Pin a 2.x minor and read the changelog before each bump. 2.12.0 needs Python 3.11 or later, which its changelog doesn't say
4. Set EventsCompactionConfig on the App for long sessions so context doesn't grow without limit
5. Keep ADK Web off public interfaces
6. Set `ADK_TELEMETRY_SCHEMA_VERSION_OPT_IN=otel_semconv_1_36` on 2.13.0 or later if dashboards or alerts read the `call_llm` span

### Strands Agents

1. Upgrade to strands-agents 1.48.0 or later, and set a private session directory rather than the /tmp default
2. Pass a model explicitly when AWS credentials aren't configured, since Bedrock is the default
3. Use interrupts or the harness's `interventions` for tools that write, send or pay
4. Run shell and file tools in the Docker or SSH sandbox when the agent runs untrusted code
5. Pin a minor version when using A2A, MCP or experimental modules

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Agent Development Kit (ADK) or Strands Agents?

Strands Agents scores 80 (A) on agent readiness against Agent Development Kit (ADK)'s 68.7 (B), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories.

### Are Agent Development Kit (ADK) and Strands Agents open source?

Yes. Agent Development Kit (ADK) is open source (Apache-2.0). Strands Agents is open source (Apache-2.0).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with Agent Development Kit (ADK) or Strands Agents

- [AgentOS vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agentos-vs-google-adk.md)
- [AgentOS vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agentos-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Agno vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agno-vs-google-adk.md)
- [Agno vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agno-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [BoxLang AI vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boxlang-ai-vs-google-adk.md)
- [BoxLang AI vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boxlang-ai-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Claude Agent SDK vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-agent-sdk-vs-google-adk.md)
- [Claude Agent SDK vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-agent-sdk-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [CrewAI vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/crewai-vs-google-adk.md)
- [CrewAI vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/crewai-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Cursor Agent SDK vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cursor-agent-sdk-vs-google-adk.md)
- [Cursor Agent SDK vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cursor-agent-sdk-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Docker Agent vs Agent Development Kit (ADK)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/docker-agent-vs-google-adk.md)
- [Docker Agent vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/docker-agent-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs guilds.run](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-guilds-run.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs LangGraph](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-langgraph.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs LlamaIndex Framework](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-llamaindex.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs Mastra](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-mastra.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs Microsoft Agent Framework](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-microsoft-agent-framework.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs OpenAI Agents SDK](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-openai-agents-sdk.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs Pydantic AI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-pydantic-ai.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs smolagents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-smolagents.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs TradingAgents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-tradingagents.md)
- [Agent Development Kit (ADK) vs AI SDK](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/google-adk-vs-vercel-ai-sdk.md)
- [guilds.run vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/guilds-run-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [LangGraph vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/langgraph-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [LlamaIndex Framework vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/llamaindex-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Mastra vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/mastra-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Microsoft Agent Framework vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/microsoft-agent-framework-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [OpenAI Agents SDK vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openai-agents-sdk-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Pydantic AI vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pydantic-ai-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [smolagents vs Strands Agents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/smolagents-vs-strands-agents.md)
- [Strands Agents vs TradingAgents](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/strands-agents-vs-tradingagents.md)
- [Strands Agents vs AI SDK](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/strands-agents-vs-vercel-ai-sdk.md)

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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