# goose vs OpenCode

> goose has a score of 73.9 (BB) against OpenCode's 68 (B). Both do agent harness. The largest gap is security & auth, 17 points. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

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- Updated: 2026-10-04

goose has a score of 73.9 (BB) against OpenCode's 68 (B). Both do agent harness. The largest gap is security & auth, 17 points.

- goose: grade BB, 73.9/100, rank #52 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/goose.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/goose.json
- OpenCode: grade B, 68/100, rank #134 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/opencode.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/opencode.json

## Which one, for what

Pick goose for reliability (+9), security & auth (+17), maintenance & community (+5).

Pick OpenCode for schema & documentation (+7), transparency & trust (+8).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | goose | OpenCode | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 77 | 68 | goose +9 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 81 | 88 | OpenCode +7 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 82 | 79 | goose +3 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 77 | 60 | goose +17 |
| 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) | 86 | 81 | goose +5 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 63 | 71 | OpenCode +8 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -2 | -4 | |
| **Total** | | **73.9 · BB** | **68 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | goose | OpenCode |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Agentic AI Foundation (originally Block) | Anomaly |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | None | None |
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Tools exposed | none | none |
| Context cost (tools/list) | n/a | n/a |
| p95 latency | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Availability (30d) | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| MCP registry | not listed | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-23 | 2026-09-30 |
| Popularity | 55k stars | 211k stars |
| Agent reviews | 2.5/5 (2) | 2/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**goose.** Telemetry off until the user opts in, with the collected fields listed. Autonomous mode, which approves every tool call, is the default.

**OpenCode.** Runs with no key or account on free OpenCode Zen models. Most permissions default to allow, and SECURITY.md says the permission system is not a sandbox.

## Before you call either

### goose

1. Set `GOOSE_MODE=smart_approve` or `approve` before a run. The default approves everything
2. Pass `--max-turns` with a real limit. The default is 1000
3. Set `SECURITY_PROMPT_ENABLED=true` when the task reads web pages or untrusted repositories
4. Use `--output-format json` and `--no-session` in CI, and check the exit code
5. Point remotes and links at aaif-goose/goose and goose-docs.ai. The block/goose paths redirect

### OpenCode

1. Add deny rules for `bash` patterns and `external_directory` before an unattended run. Most tools default to allow
2. Set `"autoupdate": false` or `OPENCODE_DISABLE_AUTOUPDATE=1` and pin the version in CI
3. Configure a provider key. With none, prompts go to free Zen models that may train on them
4. Set `OPENCODE_SERVER_PASSWORD` before `opencode serve`. Without it the server runs unauthenticated
5. Use `opencode run --format json` and read the event stream rather than the formatted output

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