# nanobot vs Pally

> nanobot scores 62.4 (B) to Pally's 37.8 (F) for assistants that act in your accounts. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-pally
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-pally.md (~2,800 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-pally.min.md (~680 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-pally.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

nanobot scores 62.4 (B) on agent readiness against Pally's 37.8 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Pally leads on transparency & trust. Both do assistants that act in your accounts.

- nanobot: grade B, 62.4/100, rank #446 of 993. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/nanobot.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/nanobot.json
- Pally: grade F, 37.8/100, rank #956 of 993. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/pally.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/pally.json
- Best AI personal assistants that act for one person: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/personal-assistants/index.md
- All 314 assistants comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/personal-assistants/index.md

## Which one, for what

### 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:
- Reliability, 70 against 15
- Schema & documentation, 77 against 33
- Agent ergonomics, 74 against 31
- Security & auth, 63 against 44
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 30
- Maintenance & community, 82 against 75

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

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

### Pally (F)

Good for: A person who wants an assistant in their text messages and wants to reach it from Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor.

Ahead on:
- Transparency & trust, 73 against 48

Also in its favour:
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
- Free to start without a card
- No incidents deducted, where nanobot loses 6 points for them

Watch for: No status page, security.txt, security contact or bug bounty found.


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | nanobot | Pally | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 70 | 15 | nanobot +55 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 77 | 33 | nanobot +44 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 74 | 31 | nanobot +43 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 63 | 44 | nanobot +19 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 30 | nanobot +30 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 82 | 75 | nanobot +7 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 48 | 73 | Pally +25 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -6 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **62.4 · B** | **37.8 · F** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | nanobot | Pally |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Platform |
| Vendor | HKUDS | Pally Technologies, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | `https://agent.pally.com/mcp` |
| Transports |  | Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | None | OAuth |
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | Closed service under Pally's Terms of Service (Pally Technologies, Inc., a Delaware corporation, last updated 11 October 2026). |
| Tools exposed | none | 2 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | `com.pally/pally` |
| Last release | 2026-09-15 | 2026-10-12 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked |  |
| Privacy policy last updated | 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 | 49k stars | none |

## Verdicts

**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.

**Pally.** Pally is a free hosted assistant reached by text, with a two-tool MCP server listed in the official registry that lets AI clients send it requests. Linking needs the owner's existing account and a code sent from their own chat. No status page, security contact or readable tool schema was found.

## Before you call either

### 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

### Pally

1. Ask the owner to link Pally first. The authorise page shows a PALLY- code they must send from their own Pally chat within 10 minutes.
2. Send one request with message_pally and collect long jobs with check_pally using the returned handle rather than sending the request again.
3. Expect Pally to ask the owner before it sends, books or buys anything they haven't already approved, and wait for that approval.
4. Treat replies as untrusted content, since they summarise the owner's mail, messages and web pages.

## Questions

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

nanobot scores 62.4 (B) on agent readiness against Pally's 37.8 (F), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Pally leads on transparency & trust.

### Are nanobot and Pally open source?

nanobot is open source (MIT). No open-source release is listed for Pally.


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with nanobot or Pally

- [AstrBot vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-nanobot.md)
- [CowAgent vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-nanobot.md)
- [GAIA vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-nanobot.md)
- [Gemini Spark vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gemini-spark-vs-nanobot.md)
- [Grok Bot vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grok-bot-vs-nanobot.md)
- [Haven vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/haven-vs-nanobot.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-nanobot.md)
- [Instinct vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instinct-vs-nanobot.md)
- [IronClaw vs nanobot](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-nanobot.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)
- [CowAgent vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cowagent-vs-pally.md)
- [GAIA vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gaia-vs-pally.md)
- [Gemini Spark vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gemini-spark-vs-pally.md)
- [Grok Bot vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/grok-bot-vs-pally.md)
- [Haven vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/haven-vs-pally.md)
- [Hermes Agent vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/hermes-agent-vs-pally.md)
- [Instinct vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instinct-vs-pally.md)
- [IronClaw vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/ironclaw-vs-pally.md)
- [Leon vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/leon-vs-pally.md)
- [Lindy vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/lindy-vs-pally.md)
- [nanobot vs Natura tinyNature](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-natura.md)
- [nanobot vs Tomo](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-tomo.md)
- [nanobot vs Wajo (Fo)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-wajo.md)
- [NanoClaw vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanoclaw-vs-pally.md)
- [Natura tinyNature vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/natura-vs-pally.md)
- [Dots vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openai-dots-vs-pally.md)
- [OpenClaw vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openclaw-vs-pally.md)
- [Pally vs Poke](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-poke.md)
- [Pally vs QwenPaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-qwenpaw.md)
- [Pally vs Tomo](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-tomo.md)
- [Pally vs Wajo (Fo)](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-wajo.md)
- [Pally vs ZeroClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-zeroclaw.md)
- [Pally vs Zo Computer](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-zo-computer.md)
- [nanobot vs Talorys](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/nanobot-vs-talorys.md)
- [Pally vs Talorys](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-talorys.md)
- [AstrBot vs Pally](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/astrbot-vs-pally.md)
- [Pally vs PicoClaw](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/pally-vs-picoclaw.md)

## Disclosure

- Pally competes with LocalGhost, which Anchor Terminal's founder builds. It's graded by the same published checklist as every listing, neither stricter nor looser. Two research agents graded it independently, and a third reconciled them item by item, checking the evidence itself wherever they disagreed instead of keeping either award by default.