head to head · open source
Paperclip vs SWE-agent
Paperclip has 80,932 GitHub stars, 14,855 forks, 5,464 open issues and last shipped yesterday. SWE-agent has 20,344 stars, 2,224 forks, 102 open issues and last shipped 4 days ago. Paperclip leads on adoption by 298% (80,932 vs 20,344 stars). Paperclip is written in TypeScript under MIT; SWE-agent is written in Python under MIT. Paperclip has attracted 18% as many forks as stars, SWE-agent 11%. Paperclip was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
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
| Paperclip | SWE-agent | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 81K | ★ 20K |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-09-14 |
| Forks | ⑂ 15K | ⑂ 2.2K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Paperclip if
- You weight community size — 81K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick SWE-agent if
- You want the SWE-agent feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and SWE-agent fits your workflow better
About Paperclip
Paperclip is an open source orchestration platform for managing teams of AI agents in production environments. It lives in the Node.js and React ecosystem and is licensed under MIT. The project addresses the operational chaos that arises when deploying multiple autonomous AI agents—such as OpenClaw, Claude Code, Codex, or Cursor—across an organization. Without coordination, teams face untraceable workflows, runaway costs, misaligned goals, and poor governance. Paperclip solves this by providing a unified dashboard that enforces org structure, budget controls, goal alignment, and auditability across heterogeneous …
read the full Paperclip overview →
About SWE-agent
SWE agent is a Python, MIT licensed open source project in the AI assisted coding and agent ecosystem. It is an agent based model for developer tools that takes a GitHub issue and tries to automatically fix it using a chosen language model. The project is associated with NeurIPS 2024 and is maintained by researchers from Princeton University and Stanford University.
read the full SWE-agent overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Paperclip or SWE-agent more popular?
Paperclip has 80,932 GitHub stars and SWE-agent has 20,344. Paperclip has the larger community by that measure.
Are Paperclip and SWE-agent free?
Both are open source. Paperclip is licensed under MIT and SWE-agent under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Paperclip and SWE-agent?
Paperclip is written in TypeScript and SWE-agent in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Paperclip or SWE-agent?
Choose Paperclip if you want the larger community (80,932 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose SWE-agent if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.