# IronClaw vs nanobot

> IronClaw scores 66.7 (B) to nanobot's 62.4 (B) for assistant proactive. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-nanobot
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-nanobot.md (~2,500 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-nanobot.min.md (~530 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-nanobot.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

IronClaw scores 66.7 (B) on agent readiness against nanobot's 62.4 (B), and leads in 2 of 7 scored categories. nanobot leads on agent ergonomics and maintenance & community. Both do assistant proactive.

- IronClaw: grade B, 66.7/100, rank #288 of 986. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/ironclaw.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/ironclaw.json
- nanobot: grade B, 62.4/100, rank #446 of 986. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/nanobot.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/nanobot.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

### IronClaw (B)

Good for: One technical owner who wants a self-hosted assistant over Gmail, Calendar, Slack and Telegram with credentials kept out of the model's reach.

Ahead on:
- Transparency & trust, 75 against 48

Watch for: Global auto-approve defaults to on in the 1.4.1 source, so tools marked ask (send, trash, delete) run without a prompt. Only financial, approval and budget effects always ask

### nanobot (B)

Good for: A technical owner who wants an assistant on their own machine across many chat apps, with file-based memory and a free choice of model.

Ahead on:
- Agent ergonomics, 74 against 69
- Maintenance & community, 82 against 74

Also in its favour:
- No key needed to call it

Watch for: No per-action approval was found in the docs or source. The agent sends messages, runs shell commands and edits files without asking


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | IronClaw | nanobot | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 67 | 70 | nanobot +3 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 74 | 77 | nanobot +3 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 69 | 74 | nanobot +5 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 66 | 63 | IronClaw +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) | 74 | 82 | nanobot +8 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 48 | IronClaw +27 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -2 | -6 | |
| **Total** | | **66.7 · B** | **62.4 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | IronClaw | nanobot |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Agent harness |
| Vendor | NEAR AI | HKUDS |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | HTTP |  |
| Auth | OAuth or key | None |
| Pricing | Freemium | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT OR Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-09-29 | 2026-09-15 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | no date given | no document linked |
| Customer content may train models |  |  |
| Terms restrict automated access |  |  |
| Terms restrict benchmarking |  |  |
| Terms or service can change without notice |  |  |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |  |  |
| Popularity | 13k stars | 49k stars |

## Verdicts

**IronClaw.** Credentials stay in an encrypted store and are injected at the host boundary, and extensions declare per-tool permissions, network targets and OAuth scopes. The global auto-approve setting defaults to on in the 1.4.1 source, so tools marked ask, such as `gmail.send_message`, run unprompted until the owner turns it off.

**nanobot.** nanobot runs on the owner's machine under the MIT licence, with no telemetry found in its source and memory kept as files the owner can read and restore. No per-action approval step was found, and the shell sandbox and workspace restriction are off by default. Five security advisories were published between March and September 2026, all with fixes.

## Before you call either

### IronClaw

1. Open Settings and turn off global auto-approve, or set send and delete tools to ask each time, before connecting mail or chat accounts
2. Install with the release installer and run `ironclaw onboard`. 1.x does not migrate 0.29 data, so use a fresh home directory
3. Call `POST /api/v1/responses` with the bearer token from `~/.ironclaw/reborn/webui-token`. Keep under 30 requests in 60 seconds
4. Resolve approval and OAuth gates in the web interface. The Responses API fails the turn instead of surfacing them
5. Connect MCP servers over HTTP only. The stdio transport is rejected

### nanobot

1. Set `tools.restrictToWorkspace` to true and `tools.exec.sandbox` to `bwrap` or `seatbelt` before giving it real accounts. Both are off by default
2. Run 0.3.0 or later. Earlier versions carry the published SSRF flaw in web fetch (GHSA-vc5v-6vwm-wf9m)
3. Keep `allowFrom` narrow on every channel and never set `["*"]` on Email, which has no pairing
4. Write secrets as `${VAR}` references in `~/.nanobot/config.json`. Plain values are stored in clear text
5. Use `nanobot -m "..."` for a one-shot run, and keep `nanobot gateway` running for channels, schedules and heartbeat

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, IronClaw or nanobot?

IronClaw scores 66.7 (B) on agent readiness against nanobot's 62.4 (B), and leads in 2 of 7 scored categories. nanobot leads on agent ergonomics and maintenance & community.

### Are IronClaw and nanobot open source?

Yes. IronClaw is open source (MIT OR Apache-2.0). nanobot is open source (MIT).


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with IronClaw or nanobot

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