head to head · open source
Hermes Agent vs chatbox
Hermes Agent has 246,492 GitHub stars, 51,615 forks, 41,784 open issues and last shipped yesterday. chatbox has 41,791 stars, 4,252 forks, 1,290 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. Hermes Agent leads on adoption by 490% (246,492 vs 41,791 stars). Hermes Agent is written in Python under MIT; chatbox is written in TypeScript under GPL-3.0. Hermes Agent has attracted 21% as many forks as stars, chatbox 10%. Hermes Agent was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (chatgpt, claude, claude-code), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Hermes Agent | chatbox | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 246K | ★ 42K |
| License | MIT | GPL-3.0 |
| Written in | Python | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-16 |
| Forks | ⑂ 52K | ⑂ 4.3K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Hermes Agent if
- You weight community size — 246K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick chatbox if
- You want the chatbox feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and chatbox fits your workflow better
About Hermes Agent
Hermes Agent is a desktop AI agent developed by Nous Research that maintains persistent memory and self improving capabilities across sessions and platforms. It operates as a local first, cross platform interface for LLMs, integrating with multiple model providers and deployment environments without vendor lock in. The agent implements a closed learning loop where it curates its own memory, creates and refines skills from experience, and supports cross session recall via full text search and summarization.
read the full Hermes Agent overview →
About chatbox
Chatbox (Community Edition) is a cross platform desktop client for large language models, written in TypeScript and released under the GPL 3.0 license. It runs on Windows, macOS and Linux, and it connects to a range of providers including OpenAI (ChatGPT), Azure OpenAI, Claude, Google Gemini Pro, Ollama and ChatGLM 6B. The project lives in the AI interaction and interfaces ecosystem, where desktop chat front ends sit between a user and one or more hosted or locally hosted model APIs. The repository carries 41,767 stars and 4,251 forks across four years of history.
read the full chatbox overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Hermes Agent or chatbox more popular?
Hermes Agent has 246,492 GitHub stars and chatbox has 41,791. Hermes Agent has the larger community by that measure.
Are Hermes Agent and chatbox free?
Both are open source. Hermes Agent is licensed under MIT and chatbox under GPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Hermes Agent and chatbox?
Hermes Agent is written in Python and chatbox in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Hermes Agent or chatbox?
Choose Hermes Agent if you want the larger community (246,492 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose chatbox if its feature set, stack or GPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.