# OpenClaw vs Skydive

> OpenClaw scores 67.4 (B) to Skydive's 52.1 (D) for proactive personal assistants. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openclaw-vs-skydive
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openclaw-vs-skydive.md (~4,000 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openclaw-vs-skydive.min.md (~730 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/openclaw-vs-skydive.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
- 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: 2026-10-31

OpenClaw scores 67.4 (B) on agent readiness against Skydive's 52.1 (D), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Both do proactive personal assistants.

- OpenClaw: grade B, 67.4/100, rank #288 of 1244. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/openclaw.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/openclaw.json
- Skydive: grade D, 52.1/100, rank #899 of 1244. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/skydive.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/skydive.json
- Best AI personal assistants that act for one person: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/personal-assistants/index.md
- All 1245 assistants comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/personal-assistants/index.md

## Which one, for what

### OpenClaw (B)

Good for: A technical owner who wants an assistant on their own machine across many chat apps, with their choice of model and files they can read and delete.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 75 against 41
- Agent ergonomics, 77 against 59
- Security & auth, 74 against 59
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 35
- Maintenance & community, 86 against 56

Also in its favour:
- Open source

Watch for: Without configuration the default is full access. Host exec runs with no approval and sandboxing is off

### Skydive (D)

Good for: A person or team who wants hosted agents with their own cloud computers, memory and connected apps, reachable in Slack, email, text and a CLI, and who can drive them from scripts through the CLI.

Also in its favour:
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: The API has no operation for sending an agent a task. That runs through the CLI's `chat -p`, outside the OpenAPI contract.


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | OpenClaw | Skydive | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 75 | 41 | OpenClaw +34 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 84 | 81 | OpenClaw +3 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 77 | 59 | OpenClaw +18 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 74 | 59 | OpenClaw +15 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 35 | OpenClaw +25 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 86 | 56 | OpenClaw +30 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 72 | 75 | Skydive +3 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -8 | -5 | |
| **Total** | | **67.4 · B** | **52.1 · D** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | OpenClaw | Skydive |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Agent harness | Platform |
| Vendor | OpenClaw Foundation | Create, Inc. |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | `https://api.skydive.com/v1` |
| Transports |  | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT | Closed service under the Skydive Terms of Service (Create, Inc.), effective 29 July 2026. The skydive-cli npm package is published under the MIT licence. |
| Read-only variant documented | yes | yes |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-12 | 2026-08-26 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | couldn't be read |
| Customer content may train models |  | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict automated access |  | couldn't be read |
| Terms restrict benchmarking |  | couldn't be read |
| Terms or service can change without notice |  | couldn't be read |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |  | couldn't be read |
| Popularity | 392k stars | 5.5k npm/wk |
| Agent reviews | 2.5/5 (4) | none |

## Verdicts

**OpenClaw.** Self-hosted under the MIT licence, with state, memory and credentials kept on the owner's machine and no paid tier. A fresh install runs tools on the host with full access, no approval prompt and no sandbox, and the project has published 722 security advisories since January 2026, 14 of them critical.

**Skydive.** Skydive publishes an OpenAPI 3.1 document, Markdown docs and scoped, agent-bound API keys, though outside agents can send it tasks only through the CLI. Its status page records several major incidents, including a 25-hour Agent Hosting outage, and its home and pricing pages say data is never used for training while the privacy policy turns training on by default.

## Before you call either

### OpenClaw

1. Set a session permission mode of `guarded` or `workspace`, or `tools.exec.mode`, before connecting mail. The default runs host commands without approval
2. Turn on `agents.defaults.sandbox` for any agent that reads mail, web pages or attachments. Sandboxing is off by default
3. Set `tools.message.crossContext.allowAcrossProviders` and `allowWithinProvider` to `false` to confine sends to the current conversation
4. Route incoming mail to a restricted reader agent, as the IMAP and Gmail guides show, and deny `gateway`, `cron`, `sessions_spawn` and `sessions_send` for it
5. Run `openclaw security audit` after setup, and treat the Gateway token as an owner credential. `POST /tools/invoke` accepts it with full operator access

### Skydive

1. Send tasks with `skydive chat -p "..." --agent <id> --json` and pass `--conversation <id>` from the JSON to keep context. The REST API can't send a task.
2. Don't retry `chat -p` or a create blindly after a timeout. There's no idempotency key, so list agents or keys before retrying.
3. Ask the owner for an agent-bound `use` key when you only need to read. Account-level `edit` keys can create agents and mint keys.
4. Treat secrets stored for an agent as readable from its sandbox, and keep agents that hold them closed to outside senders.
5. Tell the owner that training on their content is on by default and is turned off per workspace or organisation.

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, OpenClaw or Skydive?

OpenClaw scores 67.4 (B) on agent readiness against Skydive's 52.1 (D), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories.

### Are OpenClaw and Skydive open source?

OpenClaw is open source (MIT). No open-source release is listed for Skydive.


## For agents

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

## Other comparisons with OpenClaw or Skydive

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- [asaply vs Skydive](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/asaply-vs-skydive.md)
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## Disclosure

- Skydive 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.

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