# Hermes Agent vs LearnHarness

> Hermes Agent scores 68.2 (B) to LearnHarness's 59.3 (C) for assistants that remember you. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-learnharness
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-learnharness.md (~4,000 tokens)
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- 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
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-10-30

Hermes Agent scores 68.2 (B) on agent readiness against LearnHarness's 59.3 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Both do assistants that remember you.

- Hermes Agent: grade B, 68.2/100, rank #255 of 1239. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/hermes-agent.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/hermes-agent.json
- LearnHarness: grade C, 59.3/100, rank #648 of 1239. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/learnharness.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/learnharness.json
- Best AI personal assistants that act for one person: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/personal-assistants/index.md
- All 1196 assistants comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/personal-assistants/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Hermes Agent (B)

Good for: A technical owner who wants one always-on agent across chat apps with memory and scheduled jobs, on their own machine or a small server, with any model.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 80 against 63
- Agent ergonomics, 80 against 60
- Security & auth, 75 against 52
- Maintenance & community, 84 against 71
- Transparency & trust, 67 against 60

Watch for: The default terminal backend runs commands on the host, and the default `smart` mode lets an auxiliary model approve commands it rates low-risk

### LearnHarness (C)

Good for: A tutor for one learner that keeps a local record of sessions and a graph of propositions and reasoning chains.

Also in its favour:
- No incidents deducted, where Hermes Agent loses 3 points for them

Watch for: The read, ls, find and grep tools resolve against the home directory with no allow list, and their output goes to the model provider


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Hermes Agent | LearnHarness | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 57 | 56 | Hermes Agent +1 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 80 | 63 | Hermes Agent +17 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 80 | 60 | Hermes Agent +20 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 75 | 52 | Hermes Agent +23 |
| 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) | 84 | 71 | Hermes Agent +13 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 67 | 60 | Hermes Agent +7 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -3 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **68.2 · B** | **59.3 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Hermes Agent | LearnHarness |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | Nous Research | Amos Blomqvist |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports |  |  |
| Auth | None | None |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | AGPL-3.0-only |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | no |
| Last release | 2026-10-11 | 2026-10-29 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no date given |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models |  | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access |  | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking |  | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice |  | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |  | not found in the text |
| Popularity | 253k stars | 4.2k stars |
| Agent reviews | 2.8/5 (4) | none |

## Verdicts

**Hermes Agent.** Card payments always ask first and are refused in unattended sessions, and the messaging gateway denies every sender until an allowlist is set. Shell commands run on the host by default with a model judging risk, and sending mail through the Google Workspace skill is held back only by an instruction to the model.

**LearnHarness.** The in-app agent reads files but cannot change them or run commands, and a bundled skill gives other agents a documented read-only view of sessions and the knowledge graph. The project is 14 days old at 0.4.0, its file reads reach the whole home directory without approval, and it has no security policy.

## Before you call either

### Hermes Agent

1. Set `approvals.mode: manual` before giving it real accounts. The default `smart` lets an auxiliary model approve commands
2. Run the gateway with `terminal.backend: docker` or the project's Docker image when it reads mail, web pages or group chats
3. Set `memory.write_approval: true` and `skills.write_approval: true` to review what it saves about the owner
4. Leave `approvals.cron_mode` and `approvals.unattended_mode` at `deny` for scheduled and webhook runs
5. Set `TELEGRAM_ALLOWED_USERS` or the matching allowlist per channel. Never set `GATEWAY_ALLOW_ALL_USERS=true`

### LearnHarness

1. Use the bundled skill (`skills/learnharness/SKILL.md`) to read a learner's record. It needs Python 3.10 or later and writes nothing
2. Pass `--format json` before the subcommand, for example `python3 -B scripts/graph.py --format json propositions`
3. Treat stored answer keys and teacher prose as model-authored. A proposition in the graph is not evidence the learner understood it
4. Do not read `auth.json`, which sits one folder above the data folder and holds provider keys in plain text
5. Close the app or re-read when a stable snapshot matters. The readers do not lock files while the app writes

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Hermes Agent or LearnHarness?

Hermes Agent scores 68.2 (B) on agent readiness against LearnHarness's 59.3 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories.

### Are Hermes Agent and LearnHarness open source?

Yes. Hermes Agent is open source (MIT). LearnHarness is open source (AGPL-3.0-only).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with Hermes Agent or LearnHarness

- [asaply vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asaply-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Asmi vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asmi-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Boba vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boba-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Brea vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/brea-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Del vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/del-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs HireAlpha](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-hirealpha.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs OpenInstinct](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-openinstinct.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Orbits](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-orbits.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Orchid](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-orchid-ai.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs szn](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-szn.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Tab](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-tab-bot.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Zapia](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-zapia.md)
- [AstrBot vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Boski vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boski-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Caddy vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/caddy-app-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Claude Duet vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/claude-duet-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [CowAgent vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [folk vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/folk-nozomio-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [GAIA vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Gemini Spark vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gemini-spark-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Grok Bot vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grok-bot-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Haven vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/haven-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Instinct](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-instinct.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs IronClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-ironclaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Leon](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-leon.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Lindy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-lindy.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Lobby](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-lobby-os.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-nanobot.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs NanoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-nanoclaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Dots](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-openai-dots.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs OpenClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-openclaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs OpenDuet](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-openduet.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-picoclaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Poke](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-poke.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs QwenPaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-qwenpaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Tasker AI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-tasker-ai.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Town](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-town.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs ZeroClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-zeroclaw.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Zo Computer](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-zo-computer.md)
- [asaply vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asaply-vs-learnharness.md)
- [Asmi vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asmi-vs-learnharness.md)
- [Atticus vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/atticus-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [Atticus vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/atticus-vs-learnharness.md)
- [Boba vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boba-vs-learnharness.md)
- [Boski vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/boski-vs-learnharness.md)
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- [DeepTutor vs Hermes Agent](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deeptutor-vs-hermes-agent.md)
- [DeepTutor vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deeptutor-vs-learnharness.md)
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- [Hark Pro vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hark-pro-vs-learnharness.md)
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- [LearnHarness vs Wajo (Fo)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/learnharness-vs-wajo.md)
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- [Hermes Agent vs Wajo (Fo)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-wajo.md)
- [AstrBot vs LearnHarness](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-learnharness.md)

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