head to head · open source
mantis vs gentle-shell
mantis has 1,665 GitHub stars, 160 forks, 1 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. gentle-shell has 934 stars, 138 forks, 369 open issues and last shipped yesterday. mantis leads on adoption by 78% (1,665 vs 934 stars). mantis is written in Python under Apache-2.0; gentle-shell is written in TypeScript under MIT. mantis has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, gentle-shell 15%. gentle-shell was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 2 topic tags (ai-agents, code-review), 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
| mantis | gentle-shell | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 1.7K | ★ 934 |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Python | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-09-18 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 160 | ⑂ 138 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick mantis if
- You weight community size — 1.7K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick gentle-shell if
- You want the gentle-shell feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and gentle-shell fits your workflow better
About mantis
Mantis is a modular, stack agnostic toolkit of security review skills for AI coding agents, and it includes an ADK reference harness for building secure software. It lives in the developer tools, AI coding agent, and application security ecosystem, with topics such as code review, DevSecOps, multi agent systems, and hardware security. The project helps agents autonomously find, reproduce, and patch vulnerabilities while giving humans a structured way to review results.
read the full mantis overview →
About gentle-shell
gentle shell is a senior architect development harness for the Pi platform that turns a terminal coding agent into a controlled workspace with spec driven development, focused subagents, strict TDD evidence, review guardrails, and skill discovery.
read the full gentle-shell overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is mantis or gentle-shell more popular?
mantis has 1,665 GitHub stars and gentle-shell has 934. mantis has the larger community by that measure.
Are mantis and gentle-shell free?
Both are open source. mantis is licensed under Apache-2.0 and gentle-shell under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between mantis and gentle-shell?
mantis is written in Python and gentle-shell 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, mantis or gentle-shell?
Choose mantis if you want the larger community (1,665 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose gentle-shell if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.