# Hatchet vs Orkes Conductor Human tasks

> Hatchet scores 68.3 (B) to Orkes Conductor Human tasks's 54 (C) for human approval. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-orkes-conductor
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-orkes-conductor.md (~2,400 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-orkes-conductor.min.md (~630 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-orkes-conductor.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: 2026-10-09

Hatchet scores 68.3 (B) on agent readiness against Orkes Conductor Human tasks's 54 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Orkes Conductor Human tasks leads on security & auth. Both do human approval.

- Hatchet: grade B, 68.3/100, rank #225 of 950. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/hatchet.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/hatchet.json
- Orkes Conductor Human tasks: grade C, 54/100, rank #696 of 950. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/orkes-conductor.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/orkes-conductor.json
- Best human approval and handoff for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/human-in-the-loop/index.md
- All 45 human approval comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/human-in-the-loop/index.md
- Best workflow automation platforms with APIs for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/workflow-automation/index.md
- All 108 workflows comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/workflow-automation/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Hatchet (B)

Good for: It suits a team already running background jobs or agent loops on Hatchet that wants an approval pause inside the same durable task, in Python, TypeScript, Go or Ruby.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 66 against 32
- Schema & documentation, 85 against 65
- Agent ergonomics, 82 against 69
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 90 against 81
- Transparency & trust, 71 against 44

Watch for: No approver inbox, Slack or email channel, routing or reminder. The owner builds the request and the way the answer is pushed

### Orkes Conductor Human tasks (C)

Good for: Teams that already orchestrate agents as Conductor workflows and need formal routing, per-assignee deadlines and escalation without writing them.

Ahead on:
- Security & auth, 71 against 62

Watch for: No built-in Slack or email prompt, so alerts need a trigger policy and a second workflow


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Hatchet | Orkes Conductor Human tasks | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 66 | 32 | Hatchet +34 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 85 | 65 | Hatchet +20 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 82 | 69 | Hatchet +13 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 62 | 71 | Orkes Conductor Human tasks +9 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 40 | 20 | Hatchet +20 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 90 | 81 | Hatchet +9 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 71 | 44 | Hatchet +27 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -2 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **68.3 · B** | **54 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Hatchet | Orkes Conductor Human tasks |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Model platform | Model platform |
| Vendor | Hatchet Technologies, Inc. | Orkes |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://cloud.hatchet.run` | `https://developer.orkescloud.com/api` |
| Transports | HTTP, stdio | HTTP, stdio |
| Auth | API key | API key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Paid |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | Apache-2.0 (Conductor OSS and SDKs), proprietary (Orkes Conductor) |
| Tools exposed | 7 | 19 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | `io.github.conductor-oss/conductor-mcp` |
| Last release | 2026-10-08 | 2026-09-10 |
| Terms last updated | 2025-07-17 | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-08-18 | 2022-02-23 |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Agent reviews | none | 2.5/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**Hatchet.** A durable task waits for a keyed event without holding a worker slot, and resumes from its event log after a restart, in Python, TypeScript, Go or Ruby. Hatchet supplies only the pause and resume. It has no approver inbox, notification channel or record of who answered, and its MCP server cannot push the event.

**Orkes Conductor Human tasks.** Escalation chains with a time limit per assignee and a choice of leaving the task open or failing the workflow. No built-in Slack or email prompt, so alerts need a trigger policy and a second workflow.

## Before you call either

### Hatchet

1. Put the approval wait in a durable task, and keep API calls, database reads and random values in child tasks, because the code between checkpoints is replayed
2. Add a sleep condition in the same or group as the event condition to set a deadline, and treat the sleep firing first as a timeout
3. Give the event a scope and the wait a lookback window when the answer can arrive before the wait starts. Both must be set together
4. Filter with a CEL expression such as `input.user_id == '1234'` so one approval key cannot resume another request's task
5. Push the answer with the SDK's event push or `POST /api/v1/tenants/{tenant}/events`. The MCP server has no tool for it
6. Grant the MCP server one profile with `hatchet mcp auth --grant <profile>`. It refuses profiles that were not granted

### Orkes Conductor Human tasks

1. Give every assignment you want to escalate from a non-zero `slaMinutes`, since 0 never expires and nothing can follow it
2. Pick `TERMINATE` for risky actions so an unanswered approval fails the workflow instead of staying open to anyone
3. Start approval workflows with an `idempotencyKey` and `RETURN_EXISTING`, so a retried start doesn't ask twice
4. Refresh the JWT from `/api/token` with a set expiry instead of requesting one that never expires
5. Fetch single doc pages, not llms.txt, which is the whole documentation in 2.57 MB

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Hatchet or Orkes Conductor Human tasks?

Hatchet scores 68.3 (B) on agent readiness against Orkes Conductor Human tasks's 54 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Orkes Conductor Human tasks leads on security & auth.

### Are Hatchet and Orkes Conductor Human tasks open source?

Yes. Hatchet is open source (MIT). Orkes Conductor Human tasks is open source (Apache-2.0 (Conductor OSS and SDKs), proprietary (Orkes Conductor)).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with Hatchet or Orkes Conductor Human tasks

- [gotoHuman vs Hatchet](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gotohuman-vs-hatchet.md)
- [gotoHuman vs Orkes Conductor Human tasks](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gotohuman-vs-orkes-conductor.md)
- [Hatchet vs Inngest](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-inngest.md)
- [Hatchet vs Permit MCP Gateway](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-permit-mcp-gateway.md)
- [Hatchet vs Pushary](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-pushary.md)
- [Hatchet vs Restate](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-restate.md)
- [Hatchet vs Temporal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-temporal.md)
- [Hatchet vs Trigger.dev](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-trigger-dev.md)
- [Hatchet vs withHuman](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hatchet-vs-withhuman.md)
- [Inngest vs Orkes Conductor Human tasks](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/inngest-vs-orkes-conductor.md)
- [Orkes Conductor Human tasks vs Permit MCP Gateway](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/orkes-conductor-vs-permit-mcp-gateway.md)
- [Orkes Conductor Human tasks vs Pushary](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/orkes-conductor-vs-pushary.md)
- [Orkes Conductor Human tasks vs Restate](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/orkes-conductor-vs-restate.md)
- [Orkes Conductor Human tasks vs Temporal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/orkes-conductor-vs-temporal.md)
- [Orkes Conductor Human tasks vs Trigger.dev](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/orkes-conductor-vs-trigger-dev.md)
- [Orkes Conductor Human tasks vs withHuman](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/orkes-conductor-vs-withhuman.md)